BEIJING, June 28 (RIA Novosti) – A former Chinese official involved in a sex tape scandal was sentenced to 13 years in prison for bribery on Friday, China’s official Xinhua news agency reported.
Lei Zhengfu, a former district committee secretary, was also ordered to pay a $48,500 fine.
He provided help to local companies in exchange for bribes from March 2007 to November 2012, the court said in a statement.
Zhengfu, 55, was accused of accepting 3 million yuan (about $490,000) in bribes from a property developer after being blackmailed by a man who conspired with others to lure officials into having sex with women and secretly recorded their encounters in order to blackmail them. The official used the money he received in bribes to pay off the blackmailer, the court said.
In November 2012, Zhengfu was fired and expelled from the Communist Party after a tape of him having sex with an 18-year-old woman, who had reportedly been sent to him as a bribe, went viral on the Internet. The hotel room sex screenshots were titled, "Lei, the secretary who accepts sex bribes."
In late May, six members of the gang that had recorded the sex tapes were charged with extortion.
In January 2013, a total of 10 government officials and heads of state-owned enterprises in the city of Chongqing, southwest China, were dismissed after being featured in sex videos.
