The Reedley Biolab: How a Code Enforcement Officer Stumbled Into a National Security Case

Reedley, California is a town of about 25,000 in the San Joaquin Valley, best known as "The World's Fruit Basket" — an agricultural community on the eastern banks of the Kings River, 30 minutes outside Fresno. It is not known as a hub of biomedical research.

Which is why what Jesalyn Harper found inside a supposedly vacant warehouse on I Street in late 2022 was so jarring — and why its ripple effects are still unresolved in federal courts today.

Harper is a code enforcement officer. Her job takes her to hoarding situations, meth labs, and housing violations. Nothing she'd seen came close to the warehouse on I Street. Responding to a complaint about a putrid smell and a green garden hose sticking out of a supposedly vacant building, she walked into refrigerators labeled "blood" and "Ebola," vials marked in English and Mandarin with labels including "Malaria," "COVID-19," and "HIV," and a source of the smell that turned out to be droppings from over 1,000 lab-tested mice, according to an account Harper gave the Los Angeles Times in a lengthy investigation published Wednesday.

"I realized I'm in trouble, and I need to get out of this building without tipping them off that I'm scared," Harper told the Times.

What the CDC Found

When investigators began examining what was inside the Reedley warehouse, the scope became clearer. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determined that at least 20 potential infectious bacterial and viral agents were present in the building, including dengue, hepatitis B and C, herpes simplex virus, rubella virus, and SARS coronavirus, according to a Fresno County Department of Public Health application for an abatement warrant filed in civil court and cited by the Los Angeles Times.

Among the items found in freezers were bags labeled "MDMA," "Coca," and "Met" — which authorities interpreted as cocaine and methamphetamine, respectively — along with labels reading "THC" and "Amp," according to city of Reedley records cited in the Times' investigation.

Critically, the vials marked with pathogen names were never tested, according to the Los Angeles Times. That fact has haunted the case ever since, leaving open the question of whether the labeled materials were actually what they said they were, decoys, or something else entirely.

The Defendant: Jia Bei Zhu

The person at the center of the case is Jia Bei Zhu, a Chinese national who also goes by the name David He. Federal prosecutors charged Zhu in October 2023 with manufacturing and distributing misbranded medical devices and making false statements to the Food and Drug Administration, according to federal court records cited by the Los Angeles Times. He was subsequently charged with wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

The prosecution's core allegation is that Zhu was selling Chinese-manufactured COVID tests and passing them off as American-made — a COVID-era fraud with a paper trail back to manufacturing operations in China.

A 2023 report by the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party described Zhu as "a wanted fugitive in Canada and a serial fraudster." Prosecutors said in court records that Zhu would attempt to obscure his identity from government entities. A congressional committee investigating the case uncovered payments exceeding $1 million made to the operator of the Reedley business from banks in the People's Republic of China, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Zhu's attorney, Anthony Capozzi, has denied that his client ran an illicit biolab. Zhu has pleaded not guilty to all charges. He has been in custody since 2023, awaiting trial.

The Girlfriend and the One-Way Ticket

Days after the Reedley warehouse was searched, Zhu's girlfriend, Zhaoyan Wang, and their newborn son took one-way flights to China, stating in court documents it was for a family trip — though they had not returned as of the Times' publication date, according to the paper's account of federal court filings. In August 2024, Wang was charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, and distribution of adulterated and misbranded medical devices in connection to the case. She has not entered a plea and could not be reached for comment, according to the Times.

Las Vegas: The Case Gets Bigger

The longer Zhu sat in jail, the larger the case grew. On January 31 of this year, law enforcement descended on a five-bedroom tract home in northeast Las Vegas at 900 block of Sugar Springs Drive — a property Zhu had listed as collateral for bail and had called some 400 times while incarcerated, according to the Los Angeles Times. Investigators arrived in armored vehicles with drones and a robot dog.

The raid netted the arrest of Ori Solomon, a 55-year-old Israeli citizen, on federal weapons charges — authorities said he was barred from possessing weapons due to his immigration status — and accusations of improperly disposing of hazardous waste, according to the Los Angeles Times. An attorney representing Solomon did not respond to the Times' request for comment.

Inside the home's garage, investigators wearing respirators and protective clothing removed lab equipment and more than 1,000 samples of an unknown liquid. The substances were sent to an FBI lab in Maryland for testing, according to Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department records cited by the Times. Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Sheriff Kevin McMahill said the materials were consistent with what was found in Reedley.

As of the publication of the Times' investigation, nearly a month after that search, what was inside the Las Vegas home — and what it was intended for — remains unclear.

"We recognize that the public is seeking clarity. What were they testing for? What possibilities are being considered?" Christopher Delzotto, special agent in charge of the FBI in Las Vegas, said at a February news conference, according to the Times. "In cases like this, our process relies on being slow and methodical."

Zhu's attorney has said his client is "not involved in any kind of a biolab being conducted in a home in Las Vegas."

The Congressional Assessment

The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, which has been investigating the Reedley lab, published a report that laid out what is known and what remains concerning. The report concluded that "at a minimum, the Reedley Biolab shows the profound threat that unlicensed and unknown biolabs pose to our country."

At worst, the committee wrote, the investigation "revealed significant gaps in our nation's defenses and pathogen-related regulations that present a grave national security risk that could be exploited in the future," according to the report as cited by the Los Angeles Times.

The Lawfare Institute's analysis of the case, published in March 2026, noted that Zhu established his first unauthorized U.S.-based biolab in Fresno, California, with assistance from a Chinese national known to the select committee who previously worked for various entities. The same report examined how Zhu's network extended from California to Nevada — and how biosecurity regulatory gaps allowed the operation to go undetected for as long as it did.

The Regulatory Gap at the Center of It All

Whatever the full nature of Zhu's operation — and the criminal charges remain allegations; Zhu has pleaded not guilty — the case has exposed a specific and documented vulnerability: the United States has no comprehensive system to track or license small, private biological laboratories.

Large academic and pharmaceutical labs operate under federal oversight through the CDC's Select Agent Program, which governs the possession, use, and transfer of biological agents deemed high-risk. But smaller commercial labs, research operations, and storage facilities can operate with minimal federal visibility, particularly if they don't handle pathogens on the select agent list or aren't working under federal contracts.

The Reedley case became a rallying point for lawmakers pushing to close these loopholes, according to the Los Angeles Times. The case has particular urgency given what is still unknown: the pathogens found in Reedley were never tested. The materials found in Las Vegas were sent to an FBI lab but results have not been publicly released. The full scope of Zhu's network — and whether it extended beyond California and Nevada — is still under active federal investigation.

Zhu and Wang face trial in California's Eastern District Court on charges including wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, according to Doolly's reporting on the case, which indicated an April 2026 trial date.

What Remains Unanswered

The Reedley case sits at an uncomfortable intersection. At the provable minimum, it involves a Chinese national running an illegal COVID test manufacturing and distribution fraud scheme, with financial flows connected to entities in China, operating inside a warehouse full of unlicensed biological materials. Federal charges have been filed, a trial is pending, and the defendant has pleaded not guilty.

Beyond that minimum, the questions multiply: What were the labeled pathogen vials actually containing? What was the purpose of the Las Vegas operation? Were the two facilities part of a coordinated network? Was the operation purely commercial fraud, or was it something more?

The FBI has signaled it is investigating methodically. The House Select Committee has signaled concern at the national security level. The CDC determined two dozen potential pathogens were present. The vials were never tested.

Jesalyn Harper, the code enforcement officer who started it all with a report about a smell and a garden hose, probably didn't expect to end up at the center of a congressional investigation and a federal biosecurity debate. Neither, for that matter, did Reedley.