Alleged gang godmother, corrupt police on stand

By Wang Huazhong and Ma Wei (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-10-15 07:06

CHONGQING: Twenty-two people, including Xie Caiping, a woman said to be the city's only female gang boss, and two police officers accused of protecting her organization went on trial yesterday in this southwestern city following a crime sweep.

The trial in Chongqing's No 5 Intermediate People's Court was the fourth such proceeding to start since Monday. The trials began after investigations into 14 mafia-style gangs in the city.

No verdict has been reached as yet in any of the trials.

Xie, 46, from the city's Ba'nan district, faces charges of organizing and leading a gang, running illegal gambling dens, harboring people taking illegal narcotics, illegal imprisonment and bribing officials.

The indictment claims Xie put together a gang of 20 mobsters and ex-convicts and established 20 illegal casinos, which generated more than 2 million yuan ($294,000) in illegal gains before the operation was torn down in August 2008.

Local prosecutors also accused the former chief of the city's Huangnibang police station, Guo Sheng, and police officer Gan Yong of protecting Xie's gang in return for bribes.

The indictment says Xie gave the duo 180,000 yuan in exchange for protection.

The other 19 people on trial are accused of participating in a mafia-style gang, running illegal gambling dens and harboring people taking illegal narcotics.

Xie did not deny yesterday that she had set up and run gambling dens and that she had once assaulted and detained a police officer. She said she mistook the officer for a "thief from inside".

But she did deny charges of organizing and leading the gang, saying "regulations" she set were just "game rules" rather than "rules of the gang".

In addition, she said no "salary" was paid to gangsters.

Xie often used expletives as she spoke in court.

Her unrestrained lifestyle and the fact that she is the sister-in-law of one of the city's former top police officers, Wen Qiang, have put the case in the public eye.

Local media reported that Xie had "retained 16 young men for personal entertainment".

However Xie yesterday only admitted to having cohabitated with one person, her driver, who was 20 years her junior.

Yesterday's indictment against Xie did not mention Wen, 54, the former director of Chongqing's Judicial Bureau and the deputy chief of the city's police bureau.

Wen was formally arrested for protecting organized gangs in September.

Chongqing Daily yesterday reported that Wen helped protect Xie's casinos and turned a deaf ear to whistleblowers. The court heard that Xie escaped police many times because of Wen's help.

Xie reportedly managed to flee the Beiyunhu gambling house 10 minutes before a police raid in 2000.

Many people, some of them relatives of the defendants, waited outside the court yesterday.

"My son can't be a gangster, he must have just fallen into the gang's trap," said Shen Daying, the 57-year-old mother of 33-year-old defendant Tang Yong.

"He doesn't even know what the mafia is," Shen said. "Xie brought my son in because he was rich and owned cars and businesses."

Other onlookers welcomed the city's crackdown against gangs and corrupt police officers, saying it brought "confidence and hope".

"I'm here to see Wang Lijun (the city's incumbent police chief who is leading the crackdown)," said Huang Guobi, 47, who showed pictures of a brutal crime scene to China Daily. She said seven gangsters hacked her 45-year-old husband, Tian Hongmo, to death at their home in Nan'an district in 2005.

"Although my husband's case hasn't been solved yet, I believe justice will prevail."