On January 6, 2022, a reporter from Upstream News (e-mail: [email protected]) learned from authoritative sources that the People's Court of Malkang City, Sichuan Province, made a first-instance judgment on the case of He Xuemei, former secretary of the party group and director of the Liangshan Prefecture Financial Work Bureau, for accepting bribes and using influence to accept bribes, and the defendant He Xuemei committed the crime of accepting bribes and using influence to accept bribes, and decided to execute a fixed-term imprisonment of 12 years and 6 months and a fine of 1.1 million yuan. He Xuemei and Li Jun, former secretary of the Xichang Municipal CPC Committee, jointly accepted bribes of 4.8657 million yuan, and He Xuemei used her influence to accept bribes of 10.1 million yuan, a total of 14.9657 million yuan, to be recovered in accordance with law. Up to now, the relevant parties have not publicly disclosed Li Jun's punishment and sentencing.
On August 10, 2020, the website of the Sichuan Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection and Supervision released the news that He Xuemei, former secretary of the party group and director of the Liangshan Prefecture Financial Work Bureau, was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and was subject to disciplinary review and supervision and investigation. On September 11 of the same year, Li Jun, the former secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee, was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and was subject to disciplinary review and supervision and investigation. From February to March 2021, He Xuemei and Li Jun were notified by the Sichuan Provincial Discipline Inspection Commission Supervision Commission to double open.
▲ He Xuemei (data map). Image source/network
The couple fell within a month
According to a report previously published by Upstream News, "The husband and wife of the former secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee fell apart in January, and 7 years ago, they exposed peach-colored rumors" that on August 10, 2020, the website of the Sichuan Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection and Supervision released news that He Xuemei, secretary of the party group and director of the Liangshan Prefecture Financial Work Bureau, was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and was subject to disciplinary review and supervision and investigation. On September 11 of the same year, Li Jun, the former secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee, was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and was subject to disciplinary review and supervision and investigation.
On February 19, 2021, the Sichuan Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection and Supervision gave He Xuemei the punishment of expulsion from the party and public office, and the relevant circular made it clear that He Xuemei "acted arbitrarily, using the power and influence of his relatives to engage in power and money transactions, and colluded with illegal businessmen." On March 2 of the same year, the website of the Sichuan Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection and Supervision published the news that He Xuemei's husband, Li Jun, former secretary of the Xichang Municipal CPC Committee, had seriously violated discipline and law, saying that Li Jun had seriously violated the party's political discipline, organizational discipline, honest discipline, and work discipline, constituting a violation of the law and suspected of accepting bribes, and that he had not relented or relented after the Eighteenth National Congress of the Party, which was of a serious nature and had a bad impact, and decided to give Li Jun the punishment of expulsion from the party and public office.
From September 2006 to December 2008, He Xuemei and Li Jun worked together in the Xichang Municipal Party Committee, serving as deputy secretaries of the municipal party committee, deputy secretaries of the municipal party committee, and mayor respectively. In December 2008, after He Xuemei was transferred to the Liangshan Prefecture Bureau of Statistics as the secretary of the party group, he successively served as the secretary and director of the party group of the Liangshan Prefecture Bureau of Statistics, the secretary and director of the party group of the Liangshan Prefecture Government Service Center, and the secretary and director of the party group of the Liangshan Prefecture Financial Work Bureau until his downfall.
The upstream reporter noted that He Xuemei and Li Jun registered their marriage on November 25, 2009, one year after he was transferred from the Xichang Municipal Party Committee. In February 2013, a peach-colored rumor about Li Jun and He Xuemei circulated on the Internet, and then the local government issued an official letter requesting the deletion of the relevant reports on the grounds of serious inconsistencies, rumors, and slander. Two months after his involvement in the Peach Incident, In April 2013, Li Jun was promoted to Secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee.
▲ On September 11, 2020, Li Jun, the former secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee, fell from power. Image source/China News Network
Using her husband's influence to accept cash amounted to 10.1 million yuan
On March 26, 2021, the People's Procuratorate of Malkang City, Sichuan Province, filed a public indictment with the Malkang Court, accusing He Xuemei and Li Jun (handled in a separate case) of jointly accepting bribes of 4.8657 million yuan and using their influence to accept bribes of 10.1 million yuan.
The Malkang Procuratorate alleged that from 2012 to 2020, defendant He Xuemei, through Li Jun's act as mayor of the Xichang Municipal Government, or by taking advantage of Li Jun's position as secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee, sought improper benefits for others in the construction of projects and the promotion of projects, and successively accepted a total of 10.1 million yuan from Liang Ji, Zhu Gao and others.
The procuratorate alleged that in June 2012, He Xuemei "greeted" Zhang Cheng through Li Jun's act as mayor of the Xichang municipal government and sought improper benefits for Xiao Lin's friend Liang Ji in contracting the project Building 7. From 2014 to 2015, He Xuemei received a total of RMB 2.1 million from Liang Ji through Xiao Lin on three separate occasions.
The testimony of Xiao Lin, a witness accepted by the court, confirmed that through He Xuemei's "greeting", Xiao Lin successfully obtained Zhang Cheng's related projects, with a contract price of 30 million yuan. Afterwards, Xiao Lin informed He Xuemei of the news that Liang Jihui would be 8% of the contract price as a thank-you fee, and "He Xuemei agreed." Liang Ji testified that Zhang Cheng was able to take this project to himself, "mainly because of Li Jun", if Li Jun was not the main leader of Xichang City, Zhang Cheng could not listen to He Xuemei's words and do part of the project for himself.
In 2015, the Central Environmental Protection Supervision Working Group found that there were black and odorous water bodies in the Xichang Haihe River and asked the local authorities to complete rectification within the time limit. In 2016, Xichang City proposed to adopt the PPP model to comprehensively improve the water environment of the East and West Seas and Three Rivers, and reached a preliminary willingness to cooperate with a company. In 2017, because the implementation of the project exceeded the financial capacity of Xichang City in that year, the financial department has not included this project in the PPP directory database.
In 2018, a sichuan water conservancy and hydropower engineering company subcontracted the part of the "three rivers" water environment comprehensive treatment project in the east, west and sea. Due to the delay in the project being included in the PPP directory database, Zhu Peng, the actual head of the project, found Li Jun and He Xuemei and asked for help, "Because this project has entered the directory database of the Ministry of Finance, the project bidder can go to the bank for financing, and after solving the problem of funds, the construction pressure of the construction party can be alleviated." ”
From 2018 to 2020, He Xuemei took advantage of the convenience of Li Jun's position as secretary of the Xichang Municipal Party Committee to seek improper benefits for a Sichuan water conservancy and hydropower engineering company in Xichang City's Dongxi Hai Sanhe River Environment Integration Improvement Project into the PPP project management database of the Ministry of Finance on 10 occasions by accepting a total of 8 million yuan from Zhu Peng through the behavior of Xiao Ming and other state functionaries.
The upstream reporter noted that He Xuemei took advantage of her husband Li Jun's position to accept bribes of up to 10.1 million yuan, all in the form of cash, and repeatedly sent to her home in Xichang City or her Villa in Jiangyan.
The court did not accept the argument that there were circumstances of voluntary surrender
He Xuemei's defender claimed that after the defendant He Xuemei arrived at the case, he truthfully confessed the criminal facts of using influence to accept bribes, and there were circumstances of voluntary surrender, and the punishment could be mitigated or mitigated. In March 2020, the Sichuan Provincial Supervision Commission discovered that He Xuemei was suspected of accepting 2.1 million yuan and 45,000 yuan from Zhang Cheng, and it was later investigated that He Xuemei and Li Jun had jointly accepted bribes. After arriving at the case, He Xuemei confessed not only to the fact that he had jointly accepted bribes, but also confessed to the criminal facts of using influence to accept bribes for different crimes, while the Provincial Supervision Commission did not specify when He Xuemei would confess the criminal facts of using influence to accept bribes after he arrived at the case.
The Malkang Municipal People's Court of Sichuan Province held that the defendant He Xuemei confessed to the improper economic exchanges between him and Zhang Cheng that the organization had grasped at the beginning of the case, and that there were repeated thoughts in the middle of the investigation, and later confessed that the organization had already mastered the fact of accepting bribes from Zhang Cheng and others, so the criminal facts of using influence to accept bribes had already been grasped by the investigation organs, which did not conform to the situation of "self-surrender" and did not constitute voluntary surrender. Defenders' defense opinion that the defendant has voluntarily surrendered shall not be accepted.
On September 7, 2021, the Malkang Municipal People's Court rendered a first-instance judgment on He Xuemei's crime of accepting bribes and using influence to accept bribes, and the defendant He Xuemei committed the crime of accepting bribes and using influence to accept bribes, and decided to execute a fixed-term imprisonment of 12 years and 6 months and fined 1.1 million yuan, and recovered 4.8657 million yuan of stolen money obtained by He Xuemei and Li Jun, and 10.1 million yuan of stolen money obtained by He Xuemei and Li Jun, totaling 14.9657 million yuan.
Up to now, the relevant parties have not disclosed the punishment and sentencing of He Xuemei's husband Li Jun.
Upstream journalist Hu Lei intern Leng Yu