China's answer to Breaking Bad: 'Real-life Walter White made 400,000 yuan a week'

A laid-off chemical factory worker in Guangzhou has been arrested for allegedly selling the raw materials to make methamphetamines and teaching others how to make the drug in what may be a real-life version of the hit television series Breaking Bad.

The unemployed man, 58 – dubbed “Professor Xu” because of his talent at producing the addictive stimulant crystal methamphetamine using industrial chemicals – was well known among mainland gangs dealing in drugs, police told the Southern Metropolitan Daily.

For the past three years Professor Xu had allegedly travelled around the country, charging 400,000 yuan (HK$505,600) for a week’s instruction into how to make the drug.

He had attracted many willing students among drug-making gangs, the newspaper reported.

Professor Xu allegedly kept crucial drug-making details a secret so that the drug producers would need to continue to pay him for his expertise.