A court in China’s eastern province of Jiangsu sentenced Gou Zhongwen, a former member of the leading body of China’s main advisory institution, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), and former vice-mayor of Beijing, among other positions, to a suspended death sentence for two years on Monday for accepting bribes.
The Yancheng Intermediate People’s Court announced on its official Wechat social media account that it also imposed a lifetime deprivation of political rights and the confiscation of all personal property of the accused.
The court also established that, once the two-year suspension is served, the death penalty will be commuted to life imprisonment, with life imprisonment without the possibility of reduction or parole, a formula common in China for corruption cases.
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According to the ruling, between 2009 and 2024, Gou took advantage of the various positions he held in Beijing, including that of deputy mayor, to facilitate benefits to companies and individuals in matters such as business operations and project approval.
In that period, he illegally received goods worth more than 236 million yuan (30 million dollars, 25 million euros).
The court described the amount of the bribes as “particularly enormous” and stated that the conduct caused “serious losses” to the interests of the State and the citizenry. It added that the social impact of the case was “especially negative”.
However, the court took into account mitigating factors, such as the existence of attempted acts, the confession of the facts, the voluntary provision of information on undiscovered bribes, the acknowledgment of guilt, and the return of the illicit assets, all of which were recovered, according to the ruling.
Upon his arrival to power in 2012, the current General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and President of China, Xi Jinping, began an anti-corruption campaign in which several high-ranking officials have been convicted of accepting millions in bribes.
While this campaign, one of Xi’s flagship programs, has uncovered numerous cases of corruption within the CCP, some critics have pointed out that it could also be used to end the political careers of certain rivals or detractors.
