14 Punished for Marketing Fake CigarettesFourteen people who were found guilty of selling fake brand cigarettes were given prison terms from two years to life in jail Thursday, December 14.The ruling was handed down by the Beijing No.2 Intermediate People's Court. Chen Jianming, 35, a jobless Beijing resident was the major culprit in the crime and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Chen was also stripped of his political rights and all his personal gains were confiscated. Court investigations found that Chen collaborated with Jing Juliang in setting up two offices and two warehouses in the suburbs of Beijing for the purpose of marketing fake cigarettes. The two collaborated with at least 16 farmers from Guangdong and Fujian provinces of south China in smuggling 11,600 cartons of cigarettes into Beijing from February to May of 1999. They sold 10,100 cartons and netted 6.61 million yuan (US$about 796,386). Another 4,328 cartons of unsold fake cigarettes, worth 2.3 million yuan, were also confiscated from Chen's and his accomplices' storage places. Jing Juliang and three other convicts were dealt with separately. Except for Chen, 13 other criminals were given fines ranging from 70,000 yuan (about US$8,433) to 2.85 million yuan (US$343,373), respectively, plus varied jail terms. |
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