Chinese police officer sacked over property scandal

GUANGZHOU - Authorities in south China's Guangdong province on Tuesday sacked a senior policeman who allegedly owns 192 houses and has double national identity cards.

Zhao Haibin, member of the Communist Party of China (CPC) committee of Lufeng City's Public Security Bureau and deputy Party chief of a local town, was dismissed by the Lufeng CPC committee and Lufeng municipal government, an official told Xinhua late Tuesday.

An investigation team was established to carry out a thorough probe into problems of Zhao as exposed on the Internet and by the media, said the official.

Zhao allegedly owns 192 houses and has double national identity cards.

He acknowledged he had had double IDs and been a legal representative of a buildings materials company. But he denied he had 192 houses as reported by whistle-blowers.

In the early 1990s, Zhao began to do businesses and worked as a deputy general manager of a security guard company while retaining his "organization relations" in a branch of the Lufeng City Public Security Bureau. He applied for a second ID during this period.

But he did not cancel the second ID after he returned to work in the branch in 1997. He defended that no one had ever asked him to cancel the second ID.

The second ID with the name of Zhao Yong was canceled only after the recent exposure of Zhao's double IDs on the Internet.

As to the alleged 192 houses, Zhao said these properties had been jointly developed by his brother and others, and had later all been sold out. Zhao claimed he was just a "supervisor" of the properties.

A string of officials have been targeted with the exposure of their scandals by whistle-blowers since last year as the ruling party vows to continue fighting corruption.

In another case, a woman, known as "house sister," suspected of owning multiple properties with forged identities has been detained by police, authorities in northwest China's Shaanxi province said Tuesday.

Discipline authorities are investigating an anti-graft official in northeast China's Heilongjiang province over suspicions as to the legality of the 19 homes he and his former wife own.

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