Chinese Mar-a-Lago intruder Zhang Yujing should be jailed for 1½ years, US prosecutors argue

Businesswoman should get a longer sentence because she lied repeatedly to federal agents and magistrate, new court documents say

Zhang said she had US$5,000 in bank account but ‘neglected to tell’ judge about US$40,000 she had wired over two years and US$8,000 cash in hotel room

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Zhang Yujing in a photo posted on her social media account.

Published: 3:39am, 13 Nov 2019Updated: 6:04am, 13 Nov 2019

A Chinese businesswoman convicted of bluffing her way into US President Donald Trump’s private Florida club in a grey evening gown on a spring afternoon will soon learn how long she is going to prison.

Zhang Yujing, arrested for trespassing on March 30, was found guilty by a federal jury in September of entering a restricted area at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach and lying to US Secret Service agents about it.

Now, federal prosecutors would like to send the 33-year-old woman to prison for 1½ years, according to newly filed court papers. Zhang has already been behind bars for about eight months, so if a judge goes along with that proposal she could face another 10 months in prison at her sentencing on November 22 in federal court in Fort Lauderdale.

Zhang, who fired her federal public defenders before trial, is representing herself. It is likely Zhang, who is still receiving advice behind-the-scenes from the public defender’s office, will ask US District Judge Roy Altman to sentence her to the time she has already been held in detention in a Broward County lock-up.

After all, she can argue, the federal sentencing guidelines for her convictions on trespassing and lying to federal agents call for a prison term of zero to six months.

But prosecutors argue Zhang should get a longer sentence because she has lied over and over again – not just to federal agents but also to a magistrate judge who detained her before trial.