Scores of police gripping black clubs guarded a courthouse in southern China on Tuesday — the first day of a trial for two alleged gangster bosses, the “Hammerhead” and “Spicy Qin,” accused of using violence to build an empire that included everything from underground casinos to cement factories, truck lines and poultry markets.
Hundreds of people gathered outside the courthouse in the small southern coastal city of Yangjiang, Guangdong Province, hoping to get a glimpse of the alleged mob kingpins — who arrived under tight security in a police bus with black ski masks over their faces to protect them from attack and publicity.
The defendants Xu Jianqiang (許建強), known as the “Hammerhead,” and his partner, Lin Guoqin (林國欽), or “Spicy Qin,” were arrested in November 2007 in Yangjiang.
Court clerks said there were no open seats in the courtroom for an Associated Press reporter, and officials refused to provide copies of the indictment against Xu, Lin and 41 of their alleged henchmen. But a notice taped to a courthouse wall said the men were accused of leading a gangster, or “black society,” organization that engaged in fraud, tax evasion, armed robbery, illegal detention, malicious injury and gambling, “among other crimes.”
If found guilty, they could be sentenced to death for such a long list of offenses. The court hasn’t said if they’ve entered a plea for all the charges yet, and their lawyers haven’t made public comments.
But the state-run Southern Metropolis Daily reported yesterday that Xu pleaded innocent to charges of premeditated murder and gun dealing.
One court spectator said the defendants were known to have owned casinos all over the city.
“I gambled in one once. It had baccarat, everything,” said the middle-aged man, who only gave his surname, Li, because he feared the police and gangs. “These guys were so big and powerful, the police didn’t dare touch them for a long time.”
Before his arrest, Lin held high-ranking posts in several business groups and had a seat in Yangjiang’s local legislature.
Citing court documents, the Southern Metropolis Daily has described the defendants’ rise and fall. Xu, who had a reputation as a street fighter, and Lin, who was a small-time gambler, met in an illegal casino in 1990 and quickly started working together, it said, with Lin using the younger Xu as his muscle against possible gambling cheats.
The two began stockpiling guns for a gang, and the turning point in their careers came in 1992 when a major Yangjiang crime boss lost a large sum of money to Lin while gambling, the paper said. Xu beat the crime boss up and had to go into hiding.
Two years later Xu invited the boss to a meeting so they could discuss reconciliation. At the meeting, the report said, one of Xu’s henchmen shot and killed the crime boss. The killing catapulting Xu and Lin to the top of the crime community.
In 1994, they began building their casino network in hotels, resorts and health clubs. Two years later, they moved into Yangjiang’s lucrative fishing and ice-making industries. By the time of their arrest in 2007, they controlled 43 companies.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
RSS