Writing: Liu Yang, Deputy Secretary-General of the National Criminal Committee of Deheng Law Firm in Beijing
According to the Tencent News on August 22, 2023, the Hangzhou Intermediate People's Court in Zhejiang Province publicly sentenced the defendant Xiao Yi to life imprisonment for bribery, deprived of political rights for life, and confiscated all personal property, and sentenced to six years in prison for abuse of power, with the decision to execute life imprisonment, deprive of political rights for life, and confiscate all personal property; the proceeds of bribery and its interest sealed and seized in the case of Xiao Yi shall be recovered according to law and turned over to the national treasury.
People in the cryptocurrency circle are no strangers to Xiao Yi, and some even believe that the collapse of 519 is more or less related to him.
Xiao Yi is the first official mentioned in the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection's report to be involved in "mining." On the morning of November 13, 2021, the website of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervision Commission announced that Xiao Yi, former member of the Party group and vice chairman of the Jiangxi Provincial Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, had been "expelled from the Party and dismissed from public office." It is worth noting that there is something rare in the report on Xiao Yi. The report pointed out that Xiao Yi violated the new development concept, abused his power to introduce and support enterprises to engage in virtual currency "mining" activities that did not meet the requirements of the national industrial policy.
The case of Xiao Yi was publicly tried and publicly sentenced, but it also left us with many questions. I hope that the judgment will be made public in the future. Today, Lawyer Liu's circle of friends is full of such talk: "How much bitcoin did he actually receive?" Although there is a certain amount of gossip, it also shows that the people do care about this issue.
For this reason, Lawyer Liu has summarized some of his questions, hoping to get answers from official reports in the future. Some of the questions are also difficult points of handling cryptocurrency cases by the current judicial authorities, hoping to gain inspiration from the cases handled by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervision Commission, and even serve as a guide to unify the judgment of cases involving cryptocurrency.
Question 1: Did Xiao Yi receive Lin Qingxing's virtual digital currency?
Next, let's break down the official report. The report mentions two time points and there is a coincidence on the timeline: the first timeline is from 2008 to 2021, during which Xiao Yi provided assistance to relevant units and individuals in engineering contracting, project development, and job promotion. There is no explicit mention of virtual digital currency mining here, and it is not known whether it falls into the category of engineering contracting and project development. At the same time, it is mentioned that Xiao Yi illegally accepted a total of more than 125 million yuan in property, whether the "equivalent" includes virtual digital currency is not clearly stated. From another perspective, if virtual digital currency was received, it means that in the process of handling criminal cases of official crimes, virtual digital currency is considered "property." Of particular interest is the mention in the report that "more than 57.82 million yuan has not actually been obtained," which should be included in the 125 million, accounting for nearly half. Is this the rumored receipt of virtual digital currency? If so, it means that Xiao Yi did not sell the received virtual digital currency, hence the use of the phrase "has not actually been obtained" in the report.
The second timeline is during Xiao Yi's tenure as the secretary of the Fuzhou Municipal Party Committee, from 2017 to 2021, which overlaps with the first timeline. The report mentions that "violating the new development concept, violating national regulations, providing assistance to enterprises engaged in financial subsidies, funding support, and power supply guarantees for virtual currency computing production activities, causing significant losses to public property, the state, and the people, with particularly serious circumstances and particularly adverse effects." This section does not explicitly mention how much property Xiao Yi received during this period, and we cannot speculate. Lawyer Liu believes that this section of the report explains the reason why Xiao Yi was convicted of abuse of power. According to the relevant judicial interpretations of abuse of power, the filing standards include "seriously damaging the reputation of the state, or causing particularly adverse social effects, and other circumstances that cause significant losses to public property, the state, and the people."
Question 2: If Xiao Yi received virtual digital currency, how was the pricing determined at the time of sentencing? How will virtual digital currency be disposed of in the end?
This question is based on the assumption that Xiao Yi received virtual digital currency, and is for academic discussion only, not to pursue the truth. The pricing issue of virtual digital currency involved in judicial practice has always been a problem for frontline law enforcement agencies and a focal point of dispute between the prosecution and defense. From the author's practical experience, there is currently no mainstream view, whether it is based on the price at which the victim purchased virtual digital currency, or based on the price at which the suspect or defendant disposed of the proceeds, or even the so-called mainstream trading platform price, all have certain limitations or illegitimacy. If Xiao Yi did indeed receive virtual digital currency, and it is the part mentioned in the report as "not actually obtained," then it has a certain guiding significance for current judicial practice.
At the same time, the report mentions that "the proceeds of bribery and its interest sealed and seized in the case of Xiao Yi shall be recovered according to law and turned over to the national treasury." If Xiao Yi received virtual digital currency, how will it be recovered according to law? How will it be turned over to the national treasury? Currently, in cases involving cryptocurrency, judicial authorities are widely criticized for the lack of legality and transparency in the disposal of virtual digital currency. Even the most compliant method currently, "overseas disposal and repatriation," essentially involves domestic personnel entrusting overseas personnel to dispose of it, which still has some problems from the perspective of compliance with national policies. Therefore, if virtual digital currency was disposed of in this case, the disposal method is also worthy of attention and research.
Question 3: Did Xiao Yi intervene in the civil litigation between GM and Fuzhou Genesis Technology Co., Ltd.?
According to local media reports in Fuzhou, from December 9 to 11, 2017, then Secretary of the Municipal Party Committee Xiao Yi led a delegation from Fuzhou to visit Germany and held official talks with GM Foundation in Munich, Freiburg Economic Promotion Bureau, and Frankfurt TB International Company. It is widely believed that this visit played a crucial role in promoting the cooperation between Fuzhou Genesis Technology Co., Ltd. and GM.
In September 2018, the two parties had a dispute over electricity charges, and Fuzhou Genesis Technology Co., Ltd. unilaterally stopped submitting data and sending fee invoices to GM. In May 2019, GM filed a lawsuit against Fuzhou Genesis Technology Co., Ltd. in the Fuzhou Intermediate People's Court, demanding the return of 560,000 GPU and 60,580 AntMiner S9 Bitcoin ASIC mining machines entrusted to them. The first and second trials of the case both supported GM's lawsuit. Later, Fuzhou Genesis Technology Co., Ltd. submitted new evidence to the Supreme People's Court and applied for a retrial, but it was ultimately rejected. Interested friends can take a look at Lawyer Liu Yang's detailed analysis of this case.
Question 4: Did Xiao Yi's downfall have anything to do with the "Interstellar Alliance"?
According to the "China Newsweek" report, during Xiao Yi's tenure as the secretary of the Fuzhou Municipal Party Committee, he visited the headquarters of the Interstellar Alliance in Jiangxi. The official website of the Interstellar Alliance once mentioned that the Starry Big Data Industrial Park established in cooperation with the Fuzhou High-tech Zone had a total investment of 8.5 billion yuan, covering an area of 150 acres, and received nearly 100 million yuan in investment from the Fuzhou High-tech Zone Industrial Fund in December 2020. Lawyer Liu understands that the case of the Interstellar Alliance was heard in the Feng County Detention Center in Xuzhou at 9 a.m. on July 12, 2022, and the relevant persons involved in the case have already been sentenced in the first instance.
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