Triads in Canada

Canadian courts, tribunals, police and governments have documented specific cases in which groups called triads are named, but the official record uses the word rarely and carefully. One triad label that went from a tribunal to the Federal Court, the Federal Court of Appeal and the leave stage at the Supreme Court of Canada is an immigration finding: in 2013 the Immigration and Refugee Board found reasonable grounds to believe Tong Sang Lai, a permanent resident, was a prominent member of the Shui Fong, a Macau group; the Federal Court dismissed his judicial review in 2014, the Federal Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal in 2015 on a procedural ground without ruling on the membership finding, and the Supreme Court of Canada refused leave on September 24, 2015. No Canadian criminal conviction of Lai is reported. Elsewhere the record is thinner. A federal review in 1999–2000 found the first draft of Project Sidewinder, which linked triads to China’s government, deficient in almost every respect; Alex Chung’s academic study of the Big Circle Boys describes “a decentralised network of career criminals”; and the federal money-laundering documents of 2019 to 2026 describe “China-linked” and “transnational” networks without using the word. This file sets out what is documented, what is alleged, who used each label, and what has not been established.

Where the Word Comes From

“Triad” is the label that police, courts and scholars apply to a group of secret societies that trace their roots to China and are now associated mainly with Hong Kong and Macau. A November 1998 CSIS backgrounder, as reproduced by the Federation of American Scientists, said legend traces triads to the 17th century, as “initially patriotic groups” that “increasingly turned to smuggling, extortion and piracy,” and named Sun Yee On and 14K as the two largest Hong Kong societies. A 2003 U.S. Library of Congress report described a triad as “a hierarchical organization with fixed rituals and division of labor,” while saying not all transnational crime groups owe their membership or structure to the triad model. Canadian documents name 14K, Luen Kung Lok, Sun Yee On, Wo Hop To, Wo On Lok and, in the court cases below, the Shui Fong. A 1992 U.S. Senate subcommittee report described Sun Yee On as having a presence in Canada and tied Wo Hop To to criminal activity in Australia and Canada, among other places, and the July 2003 Library of Congress report said “Members of the Sun Yee On triad have settled in Toronto, Edmonton, and Vancouver”; Sun Yee On is also the society a Minister’s delegate found Kin Wah Tao to belong to (2014 FC 912).

Whether triads still matter outside Hong Kong and Macau is disputed. Yiu Kong Chu’s The Triads as Business (2000), according to its publisher, argues Hong Kong triads may be declining as other groups emerge. Sheldon Zhang and Ko-lin Chin concluded in a 2003 article that freelance criminals unconnected to triads dominate human smuggling and heroin trafficking, and a 2004 National Institute of Justice brief on their research cautioned the finding could be an artifact of its sampling; neither is about Canada specifically. A 1998 Gazette article by K. Ramsay, as summarised in a public abstract, took the opposite view for Canada: triads are “believed to exist and operate in nearly every Chinatown in Canada,” though undetected in some areas.

How Governments and Police Have Used the Word, 1992 to 2026

The migration frame, 1992 to 1994. A December 1992 U.S. Senate subcommittee staff report spoke of the “migration of secret criminal triad organizations” from Hong Kong to the United States ahead of the 1997 handover and named Kung Lok, the Luen group, as having “a major base of operations in Toronto.” The South China Morning Post summarised a 1992 report by a Canadian chiefs-of-police committee as saying “Triad and associated criminal group activity is escalating within Canada.” On November 2, 1994, Reform MP Bob Ringma cited unnamed police sources predicting that “the hub of Asian organized crime for the world” would be in Vancouver by decade’s end. He did not use the word triad.

The intelligence and Parliament frame, 1998 to 2000. The CSIS backgrounder said “approximately 18 active transnational criminal organizations represented in Canada, including Asian triads,” and described the Big Circle Boys as “a loosely affiliated group of gangs operating independently and cooperating only when needed,” adding: “While the BCB organization is not a triad, its operations are nearly as sophisticated as those of the triads.” In the Commons, Reform MP John Reynolds said on November 30, 1999 that if “we were serious we would not be playing the patsy for the triads in Vancouver,” and on September 18, 2000 Reform MP Randy White referred to “a prostitution ring run by the Big Circle Boys triad.” Those are MPs’ words, not findings.

“Asian-based organized crime,” 2001 to 2006. CISC, the national police intelligence body, used that category rather than “triad.” Public abstracts of its 2001 and 2003 reports describe the groups as extensively involved in cocaine and marijuana trafficking and, in 2003, as “largely composed of loosely-knit networks.” Its 2004 report, released in April 2005, called them “widespread, sophisticated and highly influential,” CBC reported, and quoted RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli as saying the report “gives you a foggy snapshot at best”; neither CBC nor Canadian Press coverage mentions triads. Alex Chung, whose work is covered below, wrote that CISC stopped naming the Big Circle Boys and other groups after 2002 “due to provisions on discriminatory ethnic-profiling” in a footnote. A 2003 Library of Congress report said organized crime groups “may exaggerate their links with triads in order to inspire fear” and that “no consensus exists” on the degree of triad involvement in the Canadian drug trade, adding that some officials believe the triads control the market. Public Safety Canada’s 2006 progress report noted “the shift from mainly ethnic based groups to multicultural criminal organizations.”

Ontario and Quebec police. Two police announcements show the vocabulary used in Quebec and Ontario. A Montreal police spokesperson, Dany Richler, told Global News in February 2014 that seven arrests were “related to Asian organized crime.” York Regional Police announced Project Moon in August 2019 with 42 people charged; Daily Hive reported the suspects had “ties to Asian organized crime groups and street gangs.” Daily Hive, blogTO and Global News do not use the word triad or the name Big Circle Boys in those stories.

The money-laundering frame, 2018 to 2026. Peter German’s Dirty Money reports, the Cullen Commission, FINTRAC, Finance Canada and CISC’s recent public summaries speak of “transnational organized crime,” “professional money launderers,” “underground banking” and “China-linked money laundering organizations.” None names a triad society as a launderer. German’s 2019 report and 2021 testimony did use the word, as quoted below; the federal documents (FINTRAC, Finance Canada, CISC) do not use it.

Why This File Avoids Ethnic Labels

Gangland Files does not describe any person or community by ethnicity and uses no ethnic label for a group in its own voice. Where an agency’s category or a quotation contains such a term, it sits inside quotation marks and is attributed. Several sources make the same point.

Tong Sang Lai: The Label Tested in Court

Tong Sang Lai, also styled Lai Tong Sang, is a Portuguese citizen of Macau who landed in Canada as a permanent resident on October 28, 1996, according to the Federal Court (news reports give October 20 as the day he moved to Vancouver), having been approved in Los Angeles under the immigrant investor program. The proceedings were immigration proceedings under section 37(1)(a) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which makes a person inadmissible for organized criminality. The Canadian Press reported that he “was not charged,” and no Canadian conviction has been reported. The Canada Border Services Agency argued before the Immigration Division in Vancouver, from February 26, 2013, that Lai headed the Shui Fong, also called the Water Room, a Macau group.

The evidence. Witnesses for the CBSA included former Hong Kong visa officer Jean-Paul Delisle, whose 1997 affidavit relayed information from Macau police; former Vancouver police superintendent Patrick Fogarty; and Vancouver police detective James Fisher. Fogarty testified: “I believe that Mr. Lai is the head of the Shui Fong triad out of Macau,” adding that Lai, “if not the leader, is a high-ranking member.” Fisher said he believed Lai headed the group but added, “I’m not substituting my belief for a finding by the adjudicator of the IRB.” Fogarty described a 1997 police operation, Project Fallout, that followed a wiretap in which a HK$1 million contract on Lai was discussed during a dispute between the Shui Fong and 14K over Macau’s casino business, and a July 1997 drive-by shooting at Lai’s Vancouver-area home (Canadian Press, via Global News; the Globe and Mail).

The defence. Lai’s lawyer, Peter Chapman, argued the allegations traced to the same sources and could spread “almost like a computer virus”; Fogarty called that “a bit of an exaggeration.” Chapman also argued the evidence rested on information from corrupt Macau police and on hearsay. The adjudicator said a general corruption concern “does not provide a rationale” for dismissing the Macau police information and found “no plausible explanation” for the 1997 shooting other than the one the minister offered, that Lai was targeted by a rival triad because of his position in the Shui Fong (Canadian Press, via Global News; CTV; AFP; the Globe).

The courts. The Federal Court found “abundant evidence” that triads in Macau engaged in public murder, extortion and assault. As its reasons describe the record, the evidence “directly names the applicant as a principal member of the Triads in question,” the Board member had “abundant evidence in the record, including a book and an article directly implicating the applicant as a prominent Triad member,” Lai did not testify, and he offered no material evidence in response. The Federal Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal because the certified question could not decide it, and agreed that evidence of the group’s violent conduct sufficed to show illegality without a separate equivalency analysis. The Supreme Court of Canada refused leave with costs and gave no reasons. Coverage differs on the group’s name: the board and courts used Shui Fong; the South China Morning Post called Lai the former head of the Wo On Lok.

Project Sidewinder: A Claim and the Official Verdict

Project Sidewinder was a joint RCMP–CSIS analytic project, from the mid-1990s to 1999. Its June 1997 draft, “Chinese Intelligence Services and Triads Financial Links in Canada,” was prepared by up to five analysts. The Globe and Mail reported it claimed an alliance among Beijing, Hong Kong business figures and triad gangs, and that more than 200 Canadian firms were influenced or owned by triads, business figures or state companies; CBC reported on its warnings of a tacit arrangement between Beijing and triads. Those were the analysts’ claims, as reported.

The Security Intelligence Review Committee examined it in its 1999–2000 annual report (quoted here in translation from the French text). It found no evidence of the alleged political interference, said the project was delayed rather than abandoned, and found the first draft very weak in almost every respect: below basic standards of professional and analytic rigour, reliant on insinuation, and not distinguishing legal from illegal activity. It saw no sign of a serious and immediate threat. CSIS Director Ward Elcock called the claims a “conspiracy theory,” the Globe reported. Michel Juneau-Katsuya, a former CSIS analyst on the team, maintained the findings; CBC reported in March 2023 that he “continues to stand by his findings.” RCMP Chief Supt. Richard Proulx had written on May 4, 1998 that “a substantial amount of information contained in the original project has been altered.”

The Hong Kong Visa-Office Affair

Brian McAdam, a Canadian immigration control officer in Hong Kong, alleged that locally engaged staff “with links to triads” penetrated the mission’s computer system between 1986 and 1992, that about 788 files were deleted and nearly 2,000 blank visa forms were missing, and that triad figures applied to immigrate as entrepreneurs. Those specifics come from The Province in August 1999, with the 1986–1992 dates from the Edmonton Journal in September 1999, as reproduced on a University of Waterloo course page; the Ottawa Citizen (2016) and National Post (2003) also report the broader allegations.

Cpl. Gilles Moreau of the RCMP said in September 1999, as reported by the Times Colonist (citing the Globe and Mail): “Up till now we have not found any concrete evidence to support these allegations.” The Province reported on December 23, 1999 that an RCMP report due out that day found no evidence the files were deleted or the forms missing and, while a family had handed out packets of cash to mission staff at the Hong Kong races from 1988 to 1996, was expected to say investigators “cannot prove that the family or their connections in Hong Kong got anything in return for the cash.” Cpl. Robert Read, who had pressed the allegations, was found guilty by the RCMP of “disgraceful and outrageous conduct” and ordered to resign or be dismissed. The RCMP External Review Committee, the National Post reported on September 19, 2003, found no evidence of a cover-up by the force but “important shortcomings,” and said Read was justified in going public and should be reinstated. The RCMP’s decision-maker rejected that recommendation and upheld the dismissal in early 2004; the Federal Court dismissed Read’s judicial review on June 2, 2005 (Read v. Canada (Attorney General), 2005 FC 798), rejecting his whistle-blower defence; the Federal Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal on August 22, 2006 (2006 FCA 283); and the Supreme Court of Canada refused leave to appeal in 2007. No charges were laid. This is a well-documented moment at which Canadian officials spoke of triads infiltrating a visa office. The RCMP’s 1999 inquiry found no concrete evidence for the allegations, and the later review criticised how the force had investigated them.

The Big Circle Boys: Described as a Loose Network

The Big Circle Boys are named in Canadian police and press accounts as a group active in Vancouver and Toronto from the late 1980s, tied by those accounts to credit-card counterfeiting and heroin importation. Whether they are a triad, a gang or neither is disputed. Alex Chung studied them for an Oxford doctorate (2016) and a two-volume 2019 Palgrave Macmillan book, drawing on closed police investigations, trial transcripts, informant reports and wiretap records. His thesis record finds that they are “a decentralised network of career criminals” and that they “do not fit the models of organised criminal group or mafia.” The publisher’s descriptions of the two volumes refer to “an elusive cellular network” of bosses and to a 1990s heroin market in which they competed “without a formal organisation or explicit hierarchical structure.” The book finds violence sporadic, extortion and loan-sharking limited and local, and no evidence of corruption of officials.

Chung names police investigations as his evidence base, including Projects Dragon, Edition, Eider, E-Congee and E-Page, and says the court files for Eider, E-Congee and E-Page came from B.C. courthouses. A 2014 Toronto Life feature said that in 1993 Toronto police’s Project Sea and Sky raided credit-card counterfeiting operations “run by the triads,” that in 1994 Project Luen Hop was a large heroin seizure, and that “eventually, the major triad members were arrested, deported and largely wiped out.” Those are the magazine’s words, not a police statement; Chung footnotes the name “Luen Hop.”

Silver International, E-Pirate and the Cullen Commission

Project E-Pirate was an RCMP investigation of Silver International, an alleged underground bank in Richmond, B.C. that police linked to cash supplied to River Rock casino patrons. Raids on 11 locations on October 15, 2015 seized about $6 million in cash, Global News reported. Two Global News reports use the word “triad” in connection with the case. On January 9, 2019 Global reported that a Financial Action Task Force case study alleged the underground bank served “Chinese Triads, Mexican Cartels, and Middle Eastern organized crime groups.” On February 12, 2019 Global wrote, without naming who believed it, that the alleged casinos were “believed to be run by Chinese Triads.” Global did not attribute either label to the charges, a prosecutor or a court. RCMP Insp. Bruce Ward said in 2017, the Times Colonist reported, that surveillance linked 40 organizations to “Asian organized groups” dealing in cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine.

Why E-Pirate ended. The Vancouver Sun reported in October 2019 that the Crown’s November 2017 disclosure to the defence included unredacted files from an RCMP report that held 1,369 non-redacted documents, because a civilian RCMP employee copied unredacted originals, that the defence flagged it in March 2018, and that a stay followed; Global News, citing unnamed sources, said the informant was judged at high risk of death, while the Sun reported an April 2018 RCMP report rating the risk “minimal” and later disagreement between informant specialists and investigators. No court gave reasons; the Georgia Straight reported the service said the charges did not meet its prosecution test. A stay is neither an acquittal nor a finding of guilt: none of the three was tried. Outlets differ on whether Paul King Jin, whom CBC described as a key figure in the investigation, was himself ever charged; the charges the Times Colonist listed name only Silver International, Qin and Zhu, and CBC reported he was investigated but never charged.

What Cullen found. The Final Report found that “a substantial portion of the cash being left at Silver International was derived from profit-oriented criminal activity” and that Silver was “assisting organized crime groups,” while the Commission was “unable to conclude that all of those transactions were carried out in furtherance of a money laundering scheme.” That is an inquiry’s finding, not a criminal verdict. The executive summary does not use “triad,” “Big Circle Boys” or “Chinese organized crime,” and says police “believed that those providing the cash used in these transactions were linked to transnational organized crime.”

Witnesses and commentators. Former RCMP investigator Calvin Chrustie, who worked on transnational organized crime, testified, Business in Vancouver reported in March 2021: “There appeared to be a convergence of these three networks dominating the Vancouver area.” The article lists the networks as El Chapo Guzman, Hezbollah and “Chinese triads,” which is the reporter’s wording. That was testimony, not a finding. German told a House of Commons committee on June 7, 2021 that the Big Circle Boys and triads had played a role “for some time” while any state link would be “total conjecture on my part.” His 2019 report relayed that “it has been reported that the principal Triads continue to be represented in Vancouver,” without naming a source, and added: “Seeking to align criminal activity to a specific Triad is difficult in today’s environment, however.” Global News reported that a November 2017 report by Professor John Langdale, who named the “Vancouver model” in a November 2, 2017 lecture (theBreaker), said triads drive flows of narcotics and precursor chemicals, and quoted retired RCMP officer Garry Clement as saying “The Triads were a multinational crime syndicate back in the ’90s, and we have allowed them to expand, using Canada as a base.”

Tse Chi Lop: Contested Labels, Foreign Courts

Tse Chi Lop was born in Guangzhou in 1963 and immigrated to Toronto in 1988, according to the Toronto Star (Reuters says he arrived in Canada in 1988). He is a Canadian citizen, the South China Morning Post and other outlets report. Outlets differ in how they label the group he is said to have led (table below). Reuters, citing court records, reported he was arraigned in 1998 in the Eastern District of New York, found guilty of conspiracy to import heroin and sentenced to nine years; CNN reported he pleaded guilty and was sentenced on September 26, 2000. The Star says he was imprisoned in the U.S. from 1997; CNN says he was arrested in Hong Kong in August 1998. He was released in 2006. The Star reported he was arrested alongside men it described as senior members of the Montreal-based Rizzuto family.

He was arrested at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport in January 2021 on an Australian request and arrived in Australia in December 2022. The National Post, in a story carried by an aggregator, and The Star of Malaysia reported he pleaded guilty in November 2025 to conspiring to traffic commercial quantities of border-controlled drugs and was sentenced on December 4, 2025 in Melbourne to 16 years, with parole eligibility after 10. The plea was to a drug conspiracy, not a finding about any society’s structure.

Money-Laundering Enforcement: What the Agencies Say

German, 2018. His first Dirty Money report, released June 27, 2018, found that “large-scale, transnational money laundering has been occurring in our casinos,” growing from small-time loan sharking around 2012 and peaking in 2015, when River Rock accepted $13.5 million in $20 bills in one month. CTV reported that casinos served as laundromats for cash from “international organized criminals.” Neither CTV nor the B.C. government’s release used the word triad.

FINTRAC. Its December 10, 2019 alert on casino-related underground banking, issued with CFSEU-BC, names no individuals, casinos or groups and says informal value-transfer systems such as hawala are often legitimate remittance channels. Its July 25, 2023 update focuses on “China-linked money laundering organizations,” with Hong Kong a key risk and an analysis of nearly 48,000 transactions; it names no group, says indicators are not to be used in isolation, and says that circumventing the controls is not, “in itself a crime in Canada.”

Finance Canada, CISC and the Fentanyl Czar. Finance Canada’s 2025 risk assessment says “Chinese professional money launderers have been observed to exploit underground banking schemes” to get around China’s currency controls; it does not mention triads, and it names outlaw motorcycle gangs, mafia groups and street gangs as the most interconnected networks. CISC’s public summaries for 2023, 2024 and 2025 (the last issued January 19, 2026) do not use “triad” or “Asian organized crime”; the 2025 summary describes a shift “toward networked cells from a more traditional hierarchy.” The Fentanyl Czar’s June 2025 interim report calls China a significant source of precursor chemicals and uses “Cartels based in Mexico” as its only group-specific label.

Project Endgame and the Markham Mansion

International Items Outside Canadian Proceedings

Words Used and Who Used Them

Key Figures

Where Things Stand

As of October 2026, the Lai matter ended in 2015 at the Supreme Court of Canada, and his whereabouts are not reported. No criminal trial on the E-Pirate charges was held; the civil forfeiture action against Qin was resolved by a consent order in 2021, and in March 2023 the special prosecutor declined to approve charges in E-Nationalize. Reed has been convicted and sentenced in the Zhu killing; no appeal has been reported. Tse Chi Lop was sentenced in Australia in December 2025, as reported. CISC’s January 2026 summary does not use the word triad.

The record gives no example of a Canadian criminal court accepting evidence that a defendant belonged to a triad or that a triad controlled any activity in Canada; the Lai and Tao findings were made in immigration proceedings. Chung’s study of the Big Circle Boys describes a decentralised network. Federal money-laundering documents describe functions — cash facilitators, underground banking, professional launderers — and do not name societies. The word appears mainly in immigration cases about foreign societies, in testimony, in Canadian intelligence and provincial reports, in foreign government reports and in media coverage that often relies on anonymous sources.

Standing of This File

For other organizations and investigations, see the Gangland Files profiles.