Yang Dacai, dubbed the “smiling official” after he was pictured grinning ear-to-ear at the scene of a horrific traffic accident last August, has been sentenced to 14 years in jail for accepting bribes. He smiled. As Wall Street Journal notes, he looked “oddly beatific.”
Maybe the guy is naturally disposed to smile? He’s like a cat. Could it be that we were all wrong to cast aspersions at him following this picture?
Eh. Let’s put it at “maybe.”
Prosecutors said Mr. Yang, also referred to online as “Brother Watch,” failed to explain the origin of more than 5 million yuan ($802,000) in family assets, according to the China News Service (in Chinese). An investigation found he had accepted bribes totaling 250,000 yuan from an unnamed company that needed help passing a safety inspection.
After confessing to having fallen into the “abyss of criminality,” according to the report, Mr. Yang said it was “too late for regrets,” adding: “In admitting my guilt and showing repentance, my fervent wish is that the court will give me the opportunity to once again be an upright person.”
In addition to the prison time, Mr. Yang will be fined 50,000 yuan and forfeit all of his family’s ill-gotten assets, state media said.
Yang is called “Brother Watch” because microbloggers posted five photos of him wearing luxury watches. It kick-started a corruption investigation that eventually brought him down.
‘Brother Watch’ Oddly Beatific in Face of 14-Year Prison Term (WSJ)
It’d be nice to see this kind of stuff happen in America.
Yeah, but in U-S-A! U-S-A!! political corruption is cloaked under various layers of campaign finance and other “laws” and lucrative post career positions and salaries that basically give legitimacy to the scum in Washington to enrich themselves once in and then out of office.
This is why America always pushes “rule of law” on other countries…it’s a sophisticated way to legitimize criminal activity and to make transparency so difficult, one must hire lawyers for everything. Self preservation.
(cue: Star Spangled Banner)
ouch ouch. if you believe the level of corruption in the land of the spangled banner is as equivalent,pervasive and endemic as in the land of the five star flag, you must be one of ‘em hermit crabs still entrapped in mao’s “the east is red” propaganda sea. if beng filthily rich beyond imagination is my aspiration for my next life, i want to be reborn as a princeling in the land of the new emperors (circa 2013).
Did I once say US corruption was equivalent or comparable to the CCP’s? Read again. Ouch!
However…
Princeling? Does “W” Bush dynasty ring a bell? Clinton dynasty? Ouch!
CCP forcing ‘net companies to give up real name registration info or NSA’s rampant trampling of all that’s “sacred” to ‘Mericans and their privacy (to shop on Amazon and perv on AshleyMadison)? Double Ouch!
Getting rich by pure thievery (CCP) or by massaged laws written by the guys that pay your rent (USA) to work in their favor? Keeping the wealth and power within the 1% (USA & CCP) circle? Influence, nepotism, feeding the gov’t industrial complex (CCP & USA)? It’s all different but it’s all the same, right? Triple Ouch!
Yeah, its true. Bullshit wherever you go, just lots more bullshit (and lots more danger) in some places.
But at least the US gov’t doesn’t try to stop me from watching ANY online video not on youku or tudou.
So there!
what u r saying is a crime is a crime is a crime – just like pick pocketing (in the US) is no less guilty than grand larceny (China)….boy oh boy, am i glad u r not teaching math in my precinct
Jesse Jackson Jr. Yang Dacai
stole $750,000 stole $802,000
2 1/2 years in prison 14 years in prison
And US prisons are almost certainly nicer than Chinese prisons.
Maybe the US should crack down heavier on corruption.
Jesse Jackson Jr………………… Yang Dacai
stole $750,000…………………. stole $802,000
2 1/2 years in prison…………… 14 years in prison
Maybe now it’ll maintain the spacing.
come come now. you actually believe the watch man actually stole only $750,000 (RMB or US doesnt matter) ? Look at the recent shoe trial, the infamous Party Secretary of CK was charged with the theft of an amount thats laugheable – something that village chiefs would spit on if offered…
corruption exists everywhere, its only separated by degrees of occurrences. brother watch has the unfortunate fate of being “outed” by the smart phone. he’s but a minnow. in the interim, whales who plunder billions go unpunished.