LOS ANGELES — The case of a lifetime started with a putrid smell and a green garden hose sticking out of the side of a supposedly vacant warehouse in California farm country.
Inside the sprawling building on I Street in Reedley, code enforcement officer Jesalyn Harper found vials filled with liquid — some marked in English or Mandarin, others with just a code — that bore frightening labels such as “Malaria,” “COVID-19” and “HIV.” Refrigerators, lined up in columns along a wall, had labels that read “blood” and “Ebola.”
As she walked deeper into the warehouse, passing lab workers filling pregnancy test kits, she located the source of the smell that had brought her there — droppings from 1,000 lab-tested mice, she told The Times during a recent interview. The workers were nice enough, she said, but when she started asking questions she could feel the mood change.
“I realized I’m in trouble, and I need to get out of this building without tipping them off that I’m scared,” Harper said.
Her discovery blew open an elaborate criminal case with ties to California, Las Vegas and China. The investigation in Reedley found that the lab was part of an elaborate scheme to import COVID tests from China and pass them off as American made.
But there are some who fear the operation was much more complex than that. A congressional committee uncovered payments topping $1 million made to the operator of the Reedley business from banks in the People’s Republic of China.
Wednesday, April 1, 2026
I Wonder Why This is Not Getting More Attention
No, Another Internet of Things Item I Do Not Need
Kickstarter is trying to drum up funding for "The first garment that tracks your sleep."
My BiPAP does that already, thank you very much.
Tuesday, March 31, 2026
YouTube Has Everything
Monday, March 30, 2026
How Much of the TSA Lines Was Anti-Trump Propaganda?
I am pleased that TSA employees are again getting paid but it appears that a lot of them did the right thing and kept showing up for work anyway. My wife, daughter and her family flew Boise to Los Angeles and back again this last week. At Boise, quick movement through TSA Precheck. Two minutes at LAX.
Who Woulda Thunk It?
A potentially deadly disease known as "the white plague" has been rising in the U.S. since the pandemic, health officials have warned.
Tuberculosis (TB) gets its nickname from the pale appearance of those affected with the disease in 18th- and 19th-century Europe, according to historical medical literature.
After a dip in 2020 with the onset of COVID – likely due to underdiagnosis and reduced screenings, according to health experts – cases of TB have increased every year since.
Of course the doctors interviewed emphasize COVID-19 screwed up everything (because we panicked over a disease that was really only a serious risk to a small part of the population who needed extraordinary protection). They do finally acknowledge the elephant in the room:
Another factor is a return to international travel and increased migration from countries where TB is more prevalent, according to Vivekanandan.
Gee, do you think admitting millions of people from the Third World without even a pretense of medical screening might increase exposure to a population that has not been immunized could be dangerous. Not as dangerous as losing control of Congress!