Chinese tycoon Guo Wengui sentenced to 30 years in US prison for fraud

The severe penalty comes after his conviction for a massive financial fraud scheme that a federal judge confirmed cost over 1,000 people worldwide hundreds of millions of dollars.

Guo Wengui, who fled China a decade ago and reinvented himself as a US -based Communist Party critic, was sentenced in a Manhattan courtroom packed with his supporters by Judge Analisa Torres.

Mr. Guo, who had made a fortune in Beijing as a real estate developer and had forged an alliance with a corrupt intelligence official there, fled China in 2015, settling in a $68 million Manhattan penthouse overlooking Central Park.

The judge, in sentencing him, read snippets of letters she received from victims who described losing their life savings and feeling severely anxious and shamed and having family members turn on them for their poor investment choice.