China official sentenced to death for $325 million bribery scandal

Yang Youlin was sentenced to death on July 6 by the Changzhou Intermediate People’s Court in Jiangsu province after the court found he had taken more than 2.21 billion yuan, about $325 million, in bribes over three decades. The 69-year-old former economic development official in Nanjing was convicted of a sweeping corruption case that reached across projects, business operations, land grants and working capital.

The court said Yang, who once served as executive deputy director of the Nanjing Development Zone administrative committee, had abused his positions from 1993 to 2023 to help companies secure valuable contracts in exchange for money and assets. In addition to bribery, he was convicted of embezzlement, abuse of power, offering bribes, misappropriation of public funds and money laundering. Authorities said they would try to recover the full amount of the bribes.

Public hearings in the case were held on March 18 and April 28, with more than 30 people attending. Yang pleaded guilty and expressed remorse in his final statement, but the court still imposed the death sentence, ordered the deprivation of his political rights for life and confiscated all his personal property.

The case lands as more than a courtroom judgment. In China’s political system, a death sentence for corruption is rare, but it has been used in major anti-graft cases under President Xi Jinping as a warning to officials and a signal of discipline from the center. The scale alone makes Yang’s case stand out: more than 2.21 billion yuan in illicit gains places it among the largest corruption cases in recent years.

Recent precedents show how Beijing has used the harshest penalty selectively. Luo Yulin, a former state assets official, received a suspended death sentence in 2025. Fan Yifei, a former banker, was given a death sentence with reprieve in 2024. Lai Xiaomin, a former financial executive, was sentenced to death and executed in 2021.

Yang’s punishment reflects a familiar pattern in Xi’s anti-corruption campaign: public prosecutions that highlight the reach of the party-state’s discipline machinery while also demonstrating that the most severe penalties remain reserved for cases the courts and political leadership deem exceptional.