Businesswoman sentenced to death for cheating investors

A Chinese businesswoman was today sentenced to death for cheating investors of an "extraordinarily large" amount of USD 200 million, the second such case this year in the country.
The Inner Mongolia Autonomous Regional Higher People's Court in north China upheld the verdict of the Erdos Intermediate People's Court that sentenced 42-year-old Su Yenyu to death in January this year.
Su's personal wealth has been confiscated.
She was accused of cheating investors of 1.23 billion yuan (USD 200 million) using high returns as bait, personally misappropriating 552 million yuan, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
"The amount of the fraud was extraordinarily large and caused significant damage to both the country and the people. In such cases the death penalty is mandatory," the high court said.

Su began her "illegal" fundraising in 2006, using the funds to invest in restaurants, health clubs, coal mines and farms, even buying lottery tickets worth 20 million yuan.

She burned all documents relating to her business between 2006 to October 2009.
She surrendered to police on September 20, 2011.
Ren Wenxiang, a man who supported Su's endeavors, was sentenced to five years for fraud and fined five lakh yuan.
In May, a businesswoman in southeastern China was sentenced to death on charges of stealing USD 100 million from investors.
Erdos, an emerging city surrounded by vast grasslands, has made a fortune from large reserves of coal and natural gas in the past decade.