A California pair has been charged with a number of counts of abusing at least 14 surrogate-born youngsters – some as younger as two months outdated – and dissuading a witness.
“The number of children who were subjected to this alleged horrific abuse is unprecedented,” Los Angeles District Attorney Nathan J Hochman said in a assertion.
Guojun Xuan and Silvia Zhang, who US media describe as a couple, were arrested at their Arcadia mansion on Tuesday.
The pair pleaded not guilty at a Pasadena courthouse, the BBC’s US companion CBS News reported.
Xuan, 66, and Zhang, 39, are accused of conspiring to subject 15 of the 16 youngsters residing in their home to repeated bodily abuse, after 21 youngsters were eliminated from their custody last yr.
The pair ran their own surrogacy company and are accused of making false statements to at least two girls who grew to become surrogates, indicating that Zhang was struggling to conceive, according to the felony criticism.
As of May 2025, Zhang maintained a spreadsheet that tracked 21 youngsters, including those born to surrogates.
Officials said the investigation started that month when Zhang introduced a two-month-old boy to the hospital with a head harm, telling medical workers that the child had fallen from a mattress.
The couple’s lawyer Mitchell Krems said the allegation was a “mischaracterisation” primarily based on the evidence he has reviewed, CBS News in Los Angeles reported.
Hospital workers knowledgeable law enforcement, and when police arrived at their home they found three completely different rooms called “learning centres” under the supervision of a number of nannies, which Hochman described as a “house of horrors”.
The mansion allegedly had 32 motion-activated cameras which Hochman said were used by the couple to monitor the self-discipline given by the nannies.
Footage allegedly exhibits the nannies spanking, slapping or hitting the youngsters.
One nanny, Chunmei Li, is accused of hitting the two-month-old child who suffered the head harm two days before he was introduced to the hospital.
Krems said Li was shortly fired, CBS News LA reported.
Li, 58, was beforehand charged with one felony depend of baby abuse under situations probably to cause great bodily harm or death. Hochman said she was on the run with a $105,000 (£88,800) warrant for her arrest.
In July 2025, the couple’s home was first raided by authorities, who took 21 youngsters into state custody.
Arcadia Police Department said at the time the couple’s home was first raided that the youngsters ranged in age from two months to 13 years outdated, but most were between one and three years outdated.
Fifteen of the youngsters were taken from the couple’s home while six others were residing elsewhere and also later taken into custody.
Krems said his shopper Xuan was harmless.
“He is being targeted for exercising his constitutional right to have a large family,” CBS News quoted the lawyer as saying.
Investigators believe the surrogate moms were from around the nation and they were unaware they were carrying embryos for the couple at the same time.
Melissa Brisman, the attorney for two of the surrogates, instructed CBS News: “This is wonderful news that people will be held responsible for their actions and there will be consequences if you abuse the surrogacy system”.
If convicted as charged, Xuan faces a potential most sentence of 17 years and 4 months in state prison, while Zhang faces up to 11 years and eight months. Li faces up to 12 years.
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