A former manager at Bank of Communications took freezing assets in its literal term after Chinese investigators found millions of yuan stored in his refrigerator.
Yu Tao, a former manager at BoComm’s Shanghai-based headquarters, was convicted on seven charges of bribery, according to a «Caixin» report. Prosecutors alleged that Yu accepted bribes and embezzled money totaling more than 11.5 million yuan ($1.7 million) including 8 million yuan found in the freezer of his home. Yu was sentenced to nine years in prison for what the country’s anti-graft watchdog described as «petty corruption».
According to a Shanghai court, Yu received bribes from another lender in the city from 2012 to 2019 in return for leaked bids submitted by competitors in tender or directly appointed the bank for some activities. In addition, he was also found guilty over ill-gotten gains from organizing employee competitions at the bank and buying prizes for the events.
Stashing Cash
According to the report which cited unnamed sources, Bank of Communications internally spoke to staff about the issue and even compared Yu’s storage of cash in a freezer to a scene in a local hit anti-corruption television series.
But Yu’s feat is a relatively petty matter when compared to other precedents of Chinese communist officials stashing assets at home. One of the most notable cases involved a whopping 13.5 tons of gold found in an official's Hainan-based home basement alongside millions in cash and antiques.
