On April 1, 2025, Somerset County sheriff’s deputies executed a warrant at a South Road property in Harmony and arrested Wenfeng Chen, 51, of Malden, Massachusetts. Inside, they found 1,405 marijuana plants, approximately 100 pounds of processed cannabis, a 9mm pistol, ammunition, and $1,600 in drug proceeds. Chen and his co-defendant, Xinwen Zhang, 71, of Boston, now face Class B felony charges — unlawful cultivation and drug trafficking — the kind of charges that can put you in prison for ten years, or get you deported.
It was the second time law enforcement had hit the same Harmony property. Deputies raided it in May 2024 and seized more than 1,200 plants, but no one was home.
Law enforcement would have to wait another eleven months to find Wenfeng Chen on the premises.
But one year before Chen was arrested with illicit drugs, cash, and a firearm, the Maine Wire photographed a 2017 Mercedes-Benz sedan bearing Massachusetts plates registered in Chen’s name at his Charles St. address in Malden, Mass.
The vehicle was parked at the site of a separate illicit cannabis grow, 51 Cider Hill Road in Corinna, where the local code enforcement officer had repeatedly denied requests from the owners to upgrade the electrical capacity because large-scale cannabis cultivation is illegal in that town.
Chen happened to share an address with Xiling Ou, 44, the man who owned the Corinna property until he gave it away, allegedly to his mother, Xiaoyu Lu of Guangdong Province, China.
The attorney who made that gift happen was Paul H. Mills — better known as the brother of Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D), the woman currently vying for the Democratic U.S. Senate nomination and a chance to square off against Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins.
Hellbound and Down 