Gang of 4 jailed for selling Beijing hukou
- Source: Global Times
- [07:26 June 24 2009]
- Comments
By Deng Jingyin
Four people involved in a scheme to sell household registration certificates (hukou) were jailed Monday at the Haidian District People's Court, the Beijing Daily reported yesterday.
Fu Changning and Hu Jingjian were each jailed for five years, Zhang Xichang was jailed for four and Fu Changli was jailed for three, it said.
The gang was found guilty of selling Beijing hukou to 91 people between 2003 and 2006. Each of the men had a specific role within the operation, which netted them more than 1 million yuan ($150,000).
Zhang, who worked at the admissions and placement center of the Capital University of Medical Sciences, provided employment registration certificates for college graduates, stolen from his employer.
Fu Changli, a driver for the Beijing Human Resources and Social Security Bureau provided reference letters for graduates, which he stole from his employer.
Hu posed as the owner of the Beijing Hangrunda Technology & Trade Company, a defunct business entity that served as the hukou-holders’ prospective employer, and Fu Changning helped submit the residency applications to the Haidian Public Security Bureau.
Authorities first became aware of the scam when a man surnamed Xu, who had bought a hukou from the gang, applied to transfer his son’s residence certificate to Beijing. During the application process, officials at the Dongcheng District Public Security in Beijing discovered his certificate was fake.
Investigators later determined that the reference letters, registration certificates and business license used by the gang were all out of date, China National Radio (CNR) reported yesterday.
“Hukou are very important, especially in big cities like Beijing and Shanghai,” Wang Donghua, who works for the China Youth Research Center, told the Global Times yesterday.
“Without them, people can’t get access to the welfare system, such as schooling for their children. The counterfeiters cash in on this, so we must remember that the people who buy fake hukou are also victims.”
Chinese law forbids the sale of hukou.
Among the victims of the gang was film director Wang Xiaoshuai. The fake hukou he purchased from the men was suspended after the case was exposed, the CNR report said.