Free to read: Prosecutors Will Seize Fugitive Former Official’s Assets in $400 Million Embezzlement Case
Li Chuanliang, who fled China in 2018, acquired over 1,000 properties and 38 vehicles
Li Chuanliang. Photo: File photo
A fugitive former official in Northeast China’s Heilongjiang province accused of embezzling over $400 million will have his illegal gains — including over 1,000 properties and 38 vehicles — confiscated by local prosecutors, as China strengthens its efforts to recover the ill-gotten assets of criminals who flee abroad.
Li Chuanliang, who is still at large, allegedly took advantage of his positions in the cities of Jixi and Hegang to pocket public assets worth more than 2.9 billion yuan ($407 million) and accepted nearly 49 million yuan in bribes for helping others “seek improper benefits,” according to a court notice published Friday in People’s Court Daily, a newspaper managed by the Supreme People’s Court.
Prosecutors also accused him of misappropriating another 110 million yuan in public funds for profit-making activities, in addition to registering companies with state-owned funds without authorization and awarding contracts to firms that he controlled, through which he gained 73.25 million yuan in illicit profits, the notice said.
Li, 61, resigned from the deputy mayor role in 2017 and fled China the following year. Chinese authorities issued a warrant for his arrest in December 2020, after launching an investigation into Li in July that year. Authorities have since frozen over 1.4 billion yuan of Li’s assets and seized 1,021 properties and 38 vehicles as well as other items, according to the notice.
Mudanjiang People’s Procuratorate filed an application to the city’s intermediate court to confiscate Li’s illicit gains, which the court began processing in late September.
Initial investigations found Li had transferred some of his illegal gains abroad, Heilongjiang provincial graft busters said in a statement in 2020.
One way was through Hong Kong. In July 2014, six people carrying suitcases loaded with a total of 5 million yuan of Li’s cash boarded planes flying from Jixi and Beijing to Shenzhen, a port city bordering Hong Kong, according to a court verdict published on China Judgements Online.
The majority of the money was deposited by several others using their own identification information and then wired to bank accounts Li had set up at a currency exchange shop in Hong Kong. An individual then withdrew the money in Hong Kong dollars and gave the cash to Li, the court document showed.
The two main aides who helped Li store and conceal his ill-gotten gains in this case received sentencing of between three and half years and five years behind bars, according to the verdict released in 2022.
China has stepped up its efforts in recent years to recover assets of criminals who have fled the country with illicit gains. Through methods including seeking cooperation with other countries in seizing the fugitives’ assets abroad, China recovered more than 19.6 billion yuan in illicit gains from 2014 to June 2020, according to data released by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.