Chinese judges have handed down death sentences to three members of a criminal group that ran scam centres in Myanmar. The Quanzhou Intermediate People’s Court, a high court in southeastern Fujian province, said in a statement on Tuesday that Wei Huairen, Chen Dawei and Liao Jingfang were sentenced over their roles in the “Wei family criminal gang”.
Crimes and sentences in the Wei family case
According to the court, the syndicate was involved in drug trafficking, organised prostitution, illegal casino operations, telecommunications fraud and the murder of at least two Chinese nationals. It said Wei was one of the group’s leaders and was found guilty of several offences, including murder.
Three other members were given life imprisonment, while 55 more received prison terms ranging from three years and three months to 24 years.
Scale of scam operations and regional crackdown
The court said the gang’s activities brought in more than $1.8bn. Chinese state media said on Tuesday that the group ran 14 “large-scale” compounds and used promises of high wages to lure “thousands” of Chinese nationals to Myanmar.
The ruling comes as Beijing steps up its campaign against cross-border fraud networks in southeast Asia, where scam parks have grown into an industrial-scale trade. In July, the International Organization for Migration warned that such centres employ as many as 300,000 workers, many of whom use online schemes to defraud people in the West, often elderly victims. Many of those running the schemes are trafficked foreign nationals forced to labour in prison-like compounds.
