Seven partners of jailed Shanghai property tycoon Zhou Zhengyi convicted of conspiracy to commit fraud were sentenced by the District Court Friday to between 12 and 33 months in prison.

In delivering the sentence, District Court Judge Colin Mackintosh said the behaviors of the convicted created risk in the investment market, and the community should aware that the court will not tolerate such fraud.

The seven were convicted of conspiracy to defraud and publishing a false statement over a HK$2.15 billion loan between April 2002 and August 2003.

They defrauded the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, the Securities and Futures Commission and shareholders of imGO to conceal a repayment plan for a loan Zhou took for his takeover of imGO, which was later renamed Shanghai Land Holdings.

False representations were made to hide Zhou's plan to use the cash flow of imGO to repay the loan made by Bank of China loan.

Zhou's assistant, Gong Beiying, 33, who was a prosecution witness, was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment.

The then financial controller of Shanghai Land, Habibullah Abdul Rahman, 43, was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment. The then managing director of BOCI Asia Rowena Ng See-wai, 43, got 21 months. The then vice president of BOCI, Fiona Lam Lai-chu, 40, received 21 months.

The three lawyers - Fan Cho-man, 41, Simon Lai Sau-cheong, 46, and Donald Koo Hoi-yan, 53 - will serve between 24 and 33 months.

Judge Mackintosh said the convicted, holding senior positions, had not gained from the scam, but their behaviors were dishonest.

He added that the convicted did not report the scam, even though they were aware of Zhou's intention.

Zhou was detained on the mainland in May 2003 and investigated for illegally acquiring state land and bank loans.

On June 1, 2004, he was sentenced to three years in prison for stock market fraud and was released in May 2006.

On Oct 23, 2006, Hong Kong's Independent Commission Against Corruption issued an arrest warrant against Zhou for allegedly providing false information to the SAR's stock market regulators in relation to the acquisition of the listed company in 2002.

Zhou remained on the mainland all that time, and in November 2007 a mainland court sentenced Zhou to 16 years imprisonment on corruption convictions.

Zhou, who was ranked 11th in China on Forbes magazine's 2002 wealthy list, had his 16-year jail term upheld in Shanghai in January after trying to appeal the 2007 verdict.

(HK Edition 09/06/2008 page1)