Leland Yee

Leland Yin Yee (Chinese: 余胤良; Jyutping: jyu4 jan6 loeng4; pinyin: Yú Yìnliáng; born November 20, 1948) is an American former politician who served as a member of the California State Senate for District 8, which covered parts of San Francisco and the Peninsula.

Prior to becoming state senator, Yee was a California State Assemblyman, Supervisor of San Francisco's Sunset District, and President of the San Francisco School Board. In 2004 Yee became the first Asian American to be appointed Speaker pro Tempore, making him the second highest ranking Democrat of the California State Assembly.

In 2015, Yee pleaded guilty to felony racketeering charges for money laundering, political corruption, arms trafficking, and bribery. Yee was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on March 26, 2014, on charges related to public corruption and gun trafficking—specifically, buying automatic firearms and shoulder-launched missiles from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), an Islamist extremist group located in the southern Philippines and attempting to re-sell those weapons to an undercover FBI agent, as well as accepting a $10,000 bribe from an undercover agent in exchange for placing a call to the California Department of Public Health regarding a contract at the organization.

In response to the gun running and other criminal charges against him, the California State Senate suspended Yee as a Senator on March 28, 2014. On July 1, 2015, Yee pleaded guilty to a felony racketeering count in relation to money laundering, public corruption and bribery in a joint-prosecution alongside fellow organized crime figures based in San Francisco's Chinatown. On February 24, 2016, Yee was sentenced to five years in federal prison, and was released on June 26, 2020.