Shanghai Daily news
A local court sentenced a Taiwanese man yesterday to 30 months in prison and fined him 300,000 yuan (US$36,145) for offering online gambling on European soccer matches.
The Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate People's Court also sentenced four accomplices, three from Taiwan and one Chinese American, to jail terms ranging from nine to 18 months and fined them 20,000 to 150,000 yuan each.
The court said Feng Zaizheng, 51, had set up the "perfect" gambling operation, with his accomplices in charge of book keeping, recruiting gamblers, ensuring payment and investing the profits.
The court heard that Feng's online operations took in 10 million yuan a day at their peak last summer.
Incomplete books showed the gang earned more than 1.9 million yuan in profits from August 4 to 24 last year.
Feng began setting up his online gambling business last January.
As the business grew, he took on partners, including the sentenced accomplices Xu Lidao, 35, Wang Bingjie, 28, Li Shiwei, 29, and 41-year-old Chinese American Lee Chi-feng, according to prosecutors.
"I have put millions of yuan into soccer gambling," said Zhu Dingxin, who lost money betting with Feng.
"I won about a million yuan in June but lost 4 million in August," said Zhu.
While gambling cases pop up in the city from time to time, police say this is the first time anyone in Shanghai has been prosecuted for running online gambling.
In 2001, two local bank tellers were sentenced to nine years in jail for embezzling 13 million yuan to pay off bets made on soccer matches in 1999 and 2000.
While many local residents like to bet on soccer - the city even has a lottery based on the outcomes of European soccer matches - most say they do it for fun and never risk too much money.
"I just spent several hundred yuan on bets," said Xiao Chen, 25, who has a local bookie who works for a larger organization based in Macau.
"Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose."@@
A local court sentenced a Taiwanese man yesterday to 30 months in prison and fined him 300,000 yuan (US$36,145) for offering online gambling on European soccer matches.
The Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate People's Court also sentenced four accomplices, three from Taiwan and one Chinese American, to jail terms ranging from nine to 18 months and fined them 20,000 to 150,000 yuan each.
The court said Feng Zaizheng, 51, had set up the "perfect" gambling operation, with his accomplices in charge of book keeping, recruiting gamblers, ensuring payment and investing the profits.
The court heard that Feng's online operations took in 10 million yuan a day at their peak last summer.
Incomplete books showed the gang earned more than 1.9 million yuan in profits from August 4 to 24 last year.
Feng began setting up his online gambling business last January.
As the business grew, he took on partners, including the sentenced accomplices Xu Lidao, 35, Wang Bingjie, 28, Li Shiwei, 29, and 41-year-old Chinese American Lee Chi-feng, according to prosecutors.
"I have put millions of yuan into soccer gambling," said Zhu Dingxin, who lost money betting with Feng.
"I won about a million yuan in June but lost 4 million in August," said Zhu.
While gambling cases pop up in the city from time to time, police say this is the first time anyone in Shanghai has been prosecuted for running online gambling.
In 2001, two local bank tellers were sentenced to nine years in jail for embezzling 13 million yuan to pay off bets made on soccer matches in 1999 and 2000.
While many local residents like to bet on soccer - the city even has a lottery based on the outcomes of European soccer matches - most say they do it for fun and never risk too much money.
"I just spent several hundred yuan on bets," said Xiao Chen, 25, who has a local bookie who works for a larger organization based in Macau.
"Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose."@@
