The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department announced Monday that its specialized ARMOR unit partnered with the FBI to collect more than 1,000 pieces of evidence from a residence on Sugar Springs Drive in northeast Las Vegas. Police said the ARMOR unit — an acronym for “All-Hazard Regional Multi-agency Operations and Response” — is tasked with the “detection, response, mitigation and investigation of Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, and Explosive incidents.”
Authorities reported that the items recovered included biological materials and liquid samples. Those materials were safely secured and transferred to FBI laboratories for additional testing and analysis.
Police identified the homeowner as a suspect. The individual was already in federal custody on charges related to the investigation of an illegal biolab discovered in Reedley, California, in 2023.
The North Las Vegas property is owned by Jia Bei Zhu, a Chinese national who was indicted in November 2023 for selling hundreds of thousands of Covid-19 test kits to U.S. companies without obtaining pre-market approval, pre-market clearance, emergency use authorization, or other required exemptions from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. A detailed report on the Reedley biolab released by the House Select Committee on China found that Zhu had entered the United States using a false identity.
Investigators also arrested a second suspect, 55-year-old Ori Solomon, in connection with the Las Vegas case. Solomon, who manages the Sugar Springs Drive residence as well as another property on Temple View Drive, was booked into the Clark County Detention Center on charges of disposing and discharging hazardous waste.
According to investigators, the Sugar Springs Drive house had been rented as an Airbnb, and several guests reportedly became “deathly ill” after staying there.
A witness identified as Kelly — a pseudonym used in police records — told authorities she had been hired by Solomon to clean the residence, which was rented by the room on multiple platforms, including Airbnb. Kelly told police that in April 2025, while cleaning the house, she entered the garage — an area that was typically locked — and found numerous “refrigerators/freezers, glass beakers with reddish liquid inside,” a biological safety cabinet, and what she believed was a centrifuge, according to Solomon’s arrest report.
Kelly said the garage smelled “like a hospital (not like a clean hospital but more of a foul stale stagnant air smell),” the report stated.
She told investigators that both she and Solomon’s handyman became “‘deathly ill’ after going into the garage,” according to the report. “Approximately five days after entering the garage, she was left with breathing issues, fatigue, ‘could not get out of bed,’ and muscle aches.”
The report further stated: “Kelly said a lot of people who have lived inside the house have gotten sick. One female ended up in the hospital with severe respiratory issues.” Kelly also told police that she repeatedly found dead crickets in the master bedroom while cleaning the house, something she described as “super uncommon as she had lived in Las Vegas for numerous years and never seen anything like that before.”
The Reedley biolab referenced in the Las Vegas police report previously received limited national attention despite its size and scope. National Review previously reported on the case, noting that the biolab contained “thousands of mice” infected with diseases ranging “from HIV and E. Coli to malaria and Covid-19.”
National Review reports that before his arrest, Zhu had served as vice chairman of a Chinese state-controlled company based in Xinxiang, “Henan Pioneer Aide Biological Engineering Company Limited,” and also operated a firm backed by state-controlled investors. Zhu additionally served as Chairman of the Board and General Manager of Aide Modern Cattle Industry (China) Company Limited (“Aide Cattle China”), whose board included an executive tied to a PRC defense firm and a company listed on the U.S. Entity List. Shareholders in Aide Cattle China included PRC state-controlled entities and individuals who have invested in other state-controlled firms. Through Aide Cattle China, Zhu was the primary shareholder in 11 PRC cattle companies.
Investigators determined that the Reedley biolab was not Zhu’s first illicit operation in the United States. Authorities say Zhu previously ran a similar unlicensed facility in Fresno, California. At that location, investigators believe Zhu and his associates rewired the electrical system in a manner that may have caused the fire that ultimately forced him to flee. After losing access to that site, Zhu allegedly sought out another location and repeated the process of retrofitting it for illegal laboratory use. Authorities believe Zhu transported medical equipment, transgenic mice, and suspected pathogens multiple times over several years, incurring substantial costs along the way.