Manhasset resident Linda Sun, ex-aide to NY governors, charged with PPE fraud in new indictment, court records show

The former gubernatorial aide from Long Island accused of acting as an unregistered agent of China is facing new charges connected to allegations that she steered state contracts to certain PPE vendors during the COVID-19 pandemic, receiving millions of dollars in return, federal prosecutors said Thursday.

Linda Sun, 41, a former aide to Govs. Kathy Hochul and Andrew M. Cuomo, and her husband, Chris Hu, 40, were indicted on charges of honest services wire fraud, honest services wire fraud conspiracy, bribery and conspiracy to defraud the United States in connection with the alleged scheme involving personal protective equipment (PPE), according to a newly released superseding indictment. Hu is also charged with tax evasion.

The couple are scheduled to be arraigned on the new charges Monday.

"When masks, gloves, and other protective supplies were hard to find, Sun abused her position of trust to steer contracts to her associates so that she and her husband could share in the profits," interim U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. said in a statement. 

Defense attorneys for both defendants balked at the new charges. 

Sun’s attorney, Jarrod L. Schaeffer, a partner at Abell Eskew Landau LLP in Manhattan, said in a statement to Newsday Thursday: "Scrambling to develop new theories and shoving new charges into an indictment as trial looms is both unfortunate and telling, but it is also unsurprising given how this case has proceeded and the government’s recent efforts to further delay trial in this case.

"The newest allegations continue the government’s trend of making and publicizing feverish accusations unmoored from the facts and evidence that we expect will actually come out at trial. Ms. Sun vehemently denies these latest allegations and intends to vigorously contest them in court."

Hu's attorney, Seth DuCharme, a partner at Manhattan-based Bracewell LLP, said in response to an inquiry from Newsday: "It’s been apparent over the last few months that the government has been scrambling to try to come up with a new charging theory. The superseding indictment comes as no surprise. We remain confident in Chris. I don't expect the trial date to change."

Prosecutors said Sun, as one of the state government employees tasked with purchasing personal protective equipment, steered the purchase of PPE from two vendors — the Cousin Company and the Associate Company — that had ties to Sun and Hu, while claiming falsely that the companies were recommended by the Chinese government.

But one of Sun’s second cousins operated the Cousin Company, and Hu and one of Hu’s business associates operated the Associate Company, prosecutors said.

The couple were first arrested by the FBI in September after prosecutors alleged they laundered millions of dollars in proceeds from Chinese government officials in exchange for actions taken by Sun at the behest of those officials. The couple allegedly used the money to buy their $4 million Manhasset mansion and a 2024 Ferrari, prosecutors have said.

They have pleaded not guilty to the charges. Sun and Hu are scheduled to go on trial in November. 

Newsday reported days after their 2024 arrest that Sun played a critical role in getting much-needed supplies from China in the early days of the pandemic. Sun was among those inside Cuomo’s executive chamber working on a deal with China for supplies, which resulted in the donation of masks, surgical gowns and ventilators to New York, Newsday reported then.

The state was later billed more than $700,000 by a company owned by a friend of Sun's husband that shipped the ventilators to the United States, Newsday reported in 2024.

Prosecutors have said Sun, who joined the Cuomo administration in 2012, took several actions at the request of Chinese government and Chinese Communist Party officials, including blocking representatives of the Taiwanese government from having access to Cuomo and later Hochul, in order to not anger the Chinese government, which does not recognize Taiwan as an independent country.

Sun, who worked as Hochul’s deputy chief of staff before taking a post at the Department of Labor, also obtained official state proclamations for Chinese government representatives without authorization, attempted to facilitate a trip to China by a high-level New York State politician, and arranged meetings between Chinese and New York government officials, prosecutors have said.

Sun was fired from the Department of Labor in March 2023.

In the newest alleged scheme, Sun allegedly falsified a document to suggest that Chinese officials had recommended the Cousin Company.

On March 21, 2020, prosecutors said Sun forwarded herself "an altered version of the email" she had received from the U.S. representative to the Jiangsu Trade & Business Representative Office in Albany suggesting vendors. Sun "replaced the first suggested vendor — a vendor that produced ventilators — with the Cousin Company and wrote that the Cousin Company was recommended by the Jiangsu Department of Commerce," prosecutors said. 

Hu and Sun allegedly received $2.3 million in kickbacks from the Cousin Company, prosecutors said, adding that Hu did not report the payments on his taxes.

On March 14, 2020, Sun wrote an email to officials on the state’s PPE task force, mentioning the Associate Company as a potential vendor, prosecutors said. She also emailed the company to get a price quote, they added.

An internal state document that tracked state PPE contracts, which was found on a computer owned by the defendants, said the company was "referred by Chinese chamber of commerce," prosecutors said. There was no referral for the Associate Company, prosecutors said.

Hu expected to gain $8,029,741 from the two companies' contracts with the state Department of Health, prosecutors said. In a spreadsheet found in one of Hu's electronic accounts, he wrote the word "me" in the column for the expected profits, they said.