A California library user who allegedly took home rare Chinese manuscripts and returned fake ones in their place has been charged with $216,000-worth of theft, US officials said Thursday.

Jeffery Ying used a number of aliases to get access to classics works, some over 600 years old, at the library at the University of California, Los Angeles, the Department of Justice said.

Ying, 38, would check the works out and return days later with dummy manuscripts. He would frequently travel to China shortly thereafter, charging documents say.

"The library noticed that several rare Chinese manuscripts were missing, and an initial investigation revealed the books were last viewed by a visitor who identified himself as 'Alan Fujimori,'" the DoJ said.

When detectives raided the Los Angeles area hote

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