MCLC: corrupt official sentenced

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: corrupt official sentenced
***********************************************************

Source: NYT (9/5/13):
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/06/world/asia/yang-dacai-is-sentenced-in-chi
na.html

Chinese Official, a Symbol of Greed and Corruption, Is Sentenced
By NEIL GOUGH

HONG KONG — A court in northwest China sentenced a former provincial
safety official on Thursday to 14 years in prison for graft, a year after
he became a symbol of a callous and corrupt bureaucracy when Chinese
Internet users circulated photographs suggesting he had been living beyond
his means.

The Xi’an Intermediate People’s Court issued the sentence after convicting
Yang Dacai, a former safety inspection official in Shaanxi Province, on
charges of taking bribes and possessing assets of unclear origin, Chinese
state-run news outlets reported Thursday morning. Phone calls to the court
in Xi’an seeking confirmation of the sentence went unanswered Thursday.

Mr. Yang’s case is one of many in China in recent years to demonstrate how
local officials can be held accountable to public opinion, as ordinary
citizens frequently turn to microblog posts and other online social
networks to vent complaints against rampant corruption or other abuses of
power.

However, such complaints against senior or national-level officials remain
taboo and are actively scoured from the Internet by government censors and
employees of the companies that operate online forums.

At the same time, the Chinese government has started a nationwide campaign
in recent weeks against the spreading of so-called online rumors.
Celebrity bloggers have been told to be careful what they say in online
comments, dozens of microbloggers have been arrested and several Web sites
and other Internet companies have been shut down.

At his trial last month, Mr. Yang had pleaded guilty to charges of taking
bribes worth 250,000 renminbi, or $41,000, and possessing 5 million
renminbi, or more than $800,000, in funds of doubtful origin.

Chinese news reports over the past year have commonly referred to Mr. Yang
as Brother Watch for his habit of wearing expensive wristwatches, which
was first publicly exposed by Chinese Internet users in widely circulated
microblog postings and eventually led to his downfall.

After a multivehicle pileup killed 36 people on a highway in Shaanxi on
Aug. 26 of last year, news photos showed Mr. Yang at the scene of the
accident with a smile clearly visible on his face.

Offended by what they saw as an inappropriate expression, some Chinese
Internet users began a collective online campaign to dig up dirt on Mr.
Yang, in what is referred to in China as a “human-flesh search engine.”

Internet users scrutinized photos of Mr. Yang attending public functions
and soon discovered one showing him wearing an expensive watch. Other
photos of Mr. Yang wearing different expensive watches quickly emerged and
were widely circulated on the Internet.

The state-run news media then began to cover the story of Brother Watch.
For example, a screenshot from a China Central Television news program
that was circulated online shows Mr. Yang wearing flashy watches on 11
different occasions.

Provincial party officials in Shaanxi started an investigation. In
February of this year, Mr. Yang was stripped of his posts for “serious
disciplinary violations,” and his case was referred to prosecutors.

Footage broadcast Thursday morning on China Central Television showed a
judge in the Xi’an court reading out the verdict. Mr. Yang stood facing
the judge, wearing an orange defendant’s uniform and looking notably
thinner than he had appeared in photos a year earlier. A faint smile was
clearly visible on his face.

“History’s most unfortunate smile and costliest smile belongs to ‘Brother
Watch’ Yang Dacai,” read one widely circulated posting on Thursday to Sina
Weibo, China’s Twitter-like microblogging platform. “Given the sentence of
14 years, I reckon in the future officials will definitely popularize
sullen faces.”

Chen Jiehao contributed research from Beijing.