It was a trail of blood after a double shooting that led police to an alleged illegal cannabis operation in East Vancouver in September 2023.
Now two property owners have been ordered to show how they acquired funds to buy three B.C. homes after declaring "minimal" taxable income for nearly two decades.
The B.C. Supreme Court has issued what the B.C. government says is Canada's first ever unexplained wealth order against the pair whose assets came under scrutiny after two people were shot, one fatally, in East Vancouver in September 2023.
British Columbia's Public Safety Minister Nina Krieger said Friday she was pleased the court issued the landmark order in the civil forfeiture case in Victoria on Thursday.
Krieger said in a statement that unexplained wealth orders required that targets detail how they acquired their assets "to prove that their luxury property, cars or cash were obtained legally, or risk losing them."
The order alleges Jianxin Huang and Xiao Zhen Jean Li acquired the three properties and nearly $1.5 million in cash through illicit cannabis production and failure to declare taxable income.
The government alleges that Huang was the shooter, and while he was arrested, he was never charged.
The ruling says Vancouver police were called to a property on East 28th Ave. in September 2023 for reports of shots fired, and followed a trail of blood to the rear of a property on Victoria Drive owned by Li.
A person was found nearby with multiple gunshot wounds and died the next month.
Vancouver Police said in October 2023 that the person shot dead was Zuhoruddin Mansoori. The second unnamed victim was said by police to have been recovering.
B.C.'s Director of Civil Forfeiture filed a lawsuit in December 2023 seeking to seize properties in East Vancouver and Abbotsford owned by Huang and Li and allegedly acquired unlawfully.
Huang and Li both denied allegations that they derived profits from illegal cannabis sales, with Li claiming she got funds for the properties from "salaries, gifts, inheritance and loans."
Neither Huang nor Li could be reached for comment. Li's former lawyer, who filed her response documents, said he no longer represented her and didn't know who her current lawyer was. Huang's lawyer listed in court documents could not be reached.
The court ruling says a search of the home on Victoria Dr. turned up nearly $1.5 million in cash, more than 75 kilograms of cannabis and Canada Child Benefit and BC Family Benefits applications in Li's name that claimed she made less than $1,000 a year.
The ruling says both Li and Huang reported "minimal" taxable income for nearly two decades, but Li bought the Victoria Drive home in 2005 for $588,000, another home with Huang in 2013 for $705,000 in cash, and a property in Abbotsford in 2020 for $1.7 million.
The ruling said both Huang and Li were the subject of multiple suspicious transaction reports to Canada's money laundering watchdog, the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada, from four different banks between 2017 and 2023.
The reports described large cash deposits and five-figure BC Hydro bill payments in multiple accounts with Vancouver City Savings Credit Union, the Royal Bank of Canada, TD Bank and the Bank of Nova Scotia.
The court ordered Li and Huang to produce documents related to the property acquisitions, information on several BC Hydro and Fortis BC accounts, and tax returns dating back to 2003.
B.C. adopted laws allowing for unexplained wealth orders in 2023 based on a recommendation from the Cullen Commission of Inquiry on money laundering.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 15, 2025.
Darryl Greer, The Canadian Press
