Court upholds home appliance tycoon's sentence
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A Chinese court upheld a 14-year prison term Monday for ex-chairman of electronics retail giant Gome, who was convicted of illegal business dealings, insider trading and corporate bribery.
The Beijing Municipal Higher People's Court upheld the sentence handed down in May for Huang Guangyu, in which he was also fined 600 million yuan (88.23 million U.S. dollars) and ordered to forfeit 200 million yuan worth of assets.
But Huang's wife, Du Juan, who in May received a three year and six months prison term and a fine of 200 million yuan for insider trading, had her sentence commuted Monday to three years with a three-year reprieve, according to a court statement.
The couple had lodged appeals that the original sentences were too severe, the statement said.
Huang, also known as Wong Kwong-yu, was once the richest man on the Chinese mainland and the former legal representative of both Gome and Beijing Pengrun Real Estate Development Company.
Huang was arrested in 2009.
Huang was found liable for bribes paid out by the two companies as he was personally involved or directed others to do so.
As the major shareholder of Shenzhen-listed Beijing Centergate Technologies (Holding) Co., Ltd., Huang was found guilty of insider trading of the company's stocks, with a total value of more than 1.415 billion yuan, from April to September 2007.
These dealings earned him more than 309 million yuan in trading profits.
He directly bribed or had others bribe five government officials with 4.56 million yuan in cash and properties from 2006 to 2008 in exchange for corporate benefits.
Huang, who was detained by Beijing police in November 2008, built Gome Electronics into China's biggest appliance retailer and was listed by the Hurun Report as China's richest man in 2004, 2005 and 2008.
Known as the "Price Butcher" for its low prices, Gome has more than 560 stores in more than 160 Chinese cities, including in Hong Kong and Macao.
Huang Guangyu and his brother founded the firm as a small home appliance store in Beijing in 1987.
Huang resigned as Gome's chairman in January 2009.
