Former Communist Party boss of Yunnan province to spend life behind bars
Bai Enpei given suspended death sentence for amassing millions in bribes and will have no chance of parole under changes to the criminal code
A former Communist Party boss of Yunnan province has been given a suspended death sentence for corruption, the harshest penalty imposed on a senior official arrested since President Xi Jinping launched his anti-graft drive in late 2012.
Bai Enpei, 70, was ordered to serve the term for taking massive bribes and having assets he could not account for.
Bai, a deputy head of the national legislature’s environmental protection panel at the time of his arrest, is also the first senior official jailed for life without the chance of parole or a cut in his sentence since the criminal code was amended in August last year.
The amendment bars anybody sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve for taking “extremely huge amounts of bribes and causing huge losses” from parole or a reduced sentence.
Meanwhile, Zhou Benshun, former party boss of Hebei province, has been officially charged with abusing his power and taking bribes. Zhou was a one-time top aide to disgraced security chief Zhou Yongkang, who was jailed for life in June for graft.
Zhou Benshun will be tried in the Xiamen People’s Intermediate Court in Fujian.