A Southern California couple with 21 children, most of them born to different surrogate mothers, lied to those surrogates and then subjected the kids to brutal beatings and punishments, authorities said.
Silvia Zhang and Guojun Xuan were arrested Tuesday after authorities served a search warrant at their Arcadia mansion as part of a child abuse investigation. Prosecutors have charged them with conspiracy to commit child abuse and witness intimidation.
Xuan also faces one felony count of child abuse, one felony count of accessory after the fact and five felony counts of dissuading a witness. Zhang faces one count of accessory after the fact and four counts of dissuading a witness.
The couple pleaded not guilty in court Tuesday afternoon and denied all allegations.
Attorney Mitchell Krems, who represented them at the hearing, told NBC News that Xuan did not commit child abuse, “didn’t need surrogacy for money” and is being “unfairly scrutinized” because of his Chinese background and unusually large family.
“He’s exercising his civil liberties to be able to have as many children as he wants,” Krems told NBC News. “There’s no law against that.”
Krems said Xuan’s experience in China and its former one-child policy, which was replaced in 2021 to let married couples have three children, shaped his desire for a large family.
“He moved to the United States so he can exercise his liberty to have as many children as he wants,” Krems said.
Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said the couple’s residence, which his office described as a mansion in Arcadia, 20 miles northeast of downtown L.A., was the setting for egregious abuse.
“This house could only be described as a house of horrors for these incredibly young children,” Hochman said at a Tuesday news conference.
Authorities opened their investigation last year after a 2-month-old child arrived at the hospital with head injuries. Citing a criminal complaint, Hochman alleged that a nanny struck the baby in the head on May 4, 2025.
Xuan and Zhang did not seek medical attention until days later, he said. He noted that the baby has since recovered.
Krems called what happened to the infant “horrible,” but said the blame lay squarely on the nanny and not Xuan.
“My client fired the nanny after he found out that she was abusing the child,” Krems said.
During the investigation, authorities learned that Xuan and Zhang ran a surrogacy ring out of their home and hired surrogates across the country.
Hochman said the couple often lied to the women about why they wanted children or how many children they already had.
“One surrogate in particular … was paid for both a first and second surrogacy,” he said. “She was told initially Zhang was a single mother struggling to conceive when she agreed to act as a surrogate. That was a false statement.”
The district attorney said the woman received up to $75,000 per surrogacy.
The couple also failed to tell another woman, who was seven months pregnant, that they already had 16 children, he said.
“Another surrogate, they said they were seeking the miracle baby, and they paid that surrogate $135,000,” Hochman said.
Over the years, Xuan and Zhang allegedly watched the children’s abuse on 32 motion-activated cameras they had set up around the home, Hochman said.
Hochman described three rooms the couple called “learning rooms,” where the children spent hours seated at desks under the watch of various nannies.
“Each one of these defendants monitored the nannies’ discipline of the children that were happening in the three learning centers,” the district attorney said.
During one incident, he said, a nanny forced a child “to maintain a horse stance” while Xuan could be seen on video laughing.
“In another situation, defendant Xuan entered one of the learning centers while a nanny was striking a child, and instructed the nanny to strike the child harder,” he said.
Hochman alleged that Xuan also beat a child across the bare buttocks and struck the child’s head.
“Defendant Xuan also lifted the child into the air by one arm, while continuing to strike him and repeatedly struck the child’s head from side to side with sufficient force that the child’s body lurched into alternating directions with the blows,” he told reporters.
He said the children were punished, physically abused and beaten “on a daily basis.”
One room in the home had no cameras. Hochman said staff would take the children into that room, and others could hear them “screaming from inside.”
According to Hochman, the couple tried to cover up the alleged abuse by instructing the children to lie. At a meeting after the 2-month-old went to the hospital, the couple allegedly told the nannies not to leave visible marks on the children.
“This case is unprecedented,” Hochman said. “It is horrific, and the physical abuse, beating, and punishment that these very young children received is despicable.”
The DA’s office and court records show that prosecutors charged Chunmei Li, the nanny alleged to have been seen on video hitting the 2-month-old baby, with felony child abuse in May 2025.
Records show an arrest warrant is out for the 58-year-old, and authorities have not apprehended her. Court records list no attorney for her, and the L.A. County public defender’s office did not immediately respond Tuesday to an email asking whether it represents her.
Krems said Xuan “fired the nanny and the people who are culpable for inappropriate discipline.”
Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert G. Luna said the children endured “horrific abuse.”
All 21 children are now in state custody.
Prosecutors asked for $100 million bail per person, citing the serious nature of the charges and claiming the pair are flight risks.
The judge set bail at $20 million each, with home detention and a protective order barring them from visiting their children.
A bail review hearing is set for Monday.
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