Court upholds death sentence for businesswoman on fraud

An east China court said on Tuesday that it has upheld a death sentence with a two-year reprieve for a businesswoman over financial fraud.

The Jiangsu Provincial Supreme People's Court dismissed Gu Chunfang's appeal for leniency, and upheld the first-instance verdict given by Suzhou Intermediate People's Court in October last year.

The 42-year-old businesswoman was charged with financial fraud involving 1.7 billion yuan (275.97 million U.S. dollars).

From 2008 to March 2012, Gu, who had huge personal debts, illegally raised a total of 1.7 billion yuan in loans from the public with the promise of high interest. She was unable to return 459 million yuan when investigated, according to the court.

She went missing in early March 2012, but was arrested by police in Shanghai at the end of the same month.

The court has confiscated all of Gu's personal assets. She was the legal representative of a trade company in Suzhou City, Jiangsu.

Gu argued in her appeal that she raised funds through her connections rather than from the public, and she borrowed some of the money in loans from a company.

However, the court held that from August to October 2011, Gu fabricated information about her coal trade business in order to borrow loans totaling 40 million yuan from a rural small loan company and other units.