NEW YORK: On Wednesday, the jury selection for the criminal trial of exiled Chinese businessman Guo Wengui will begin. US prosecutors have charged him with defrauding thousands of investors and supporters of more than$ 1 billion.
The trial was next into July in Manhattan before US District Judge Analisa Torres.
Prosecutors want to prevent Guo, a vehement critic of China’s Communist Party, from obtaining classified information during hear testimony, as is expected to effect on delicate subjects.
Guo, who has several names including Miles Guo, Miles Kwok and Ho Wan Kwok, has pleaded not guilty to 12 costs including stocks fraud, wire fraud, immoral financial dealings and crime, including for money laundering.
He has been jailed in Brooklyn since his March 2023 imprisonment, and may face years in jail if convicted. Federal jail data indicate that he is 57, whereas his age is 54 and 55.
Steve Bannon, a former aide to former US President Donald Trump, and former US president Guo have long been friends.
It was on Guo’s$ 37 million sailboat, the Lady May, where Bannon was arrested in 2020 in a separate scam situation. In the final moments of his presidency, Trump pardoned Bannon, which was the end of that situation. Bannon had pleaded not guilty.
Guo and his associates were charged with using his and his collaborators ‘ extensive virtual following and hundreds of thousands of fans to defraud shareholders in a media corporation, a cryptocurrency venture, and two other scam strategies.
Guo allegedly stole money to pay for an extravagant lifestyle, including a$ 3.5 million Ferrari for his son, and two$ 36, 000 mattresses, but the prosecution only delivered the promised outsized financial gains.
Prosecutors have also sought the forfeiture of the mansion, the yacht, bank accounts, a Bugatti, a Lamborghini and a Rolls Royce.
Their case against Guo may have been strengthened as Yvette Wang, his former chief of staff, entered a guilty plea on May 3 to conspiring to commit both wire fraud and money laundering. Her sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 10.
Special measures for jurors
Guo left China in 2014 as part of a government crackdown against corruption led by President Xi Jinping. Officials there accused Guo of bribery, money laundering and other crimes, which he has denied.
After moving to the United States, Guo bought a home in the Sherry- Netherland on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue, and drew ardent fans through his criticism of China’s government, including by accusing leaders of corruption.
At Beijing’s request, the global police organization Interpol in April 2017 issued a “red notice” for Guo’s arrest.
Last month, Torres rejected Guo’s bid to dismiss the indictment, saying prosecutors could try to establish a pattern of racketeering at trial.
Jurors will be partially sequestered and kept from the general public.
This reflects in part what Torres called Guo’s “history of using his organization to harass and threaten those who dare to criticize and oppose him,” and the considerable public interest in the case.
Torres kept Guo in jail out of concern that if he was released, he would pose a significant flight risk and threat to the neighborhood. In June, a federal appeals court upheld her judgment.
Guo applied for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Massachusetts in February 2022. Later, that case was combined with the bankruptcies of other businesses he controlled. Guo’s request to put the bankruptcy cases on hold has been rejected by Torres.
