Four men were sentenced to death by South China's Shenzhen...

Four men were sentenced to death by South China's Shenzhen Intermediate People's Court. The four were among 19 defendants convicted in three drug smuggling cases. In the first case, the court heard that in April 2001, 34-year-old Hong Kong resident Mo Keliang (originally from Zhuhai city in south China's Guangdong province), together with a Hong Kong criminal nicknamed "Huayao" who is on the run, smuggled crystal methamphetamine (commonly known as "ice") in a boat from the city of Shenzhen to the Philippines.
The two also got two Hong Kong residents, Liu Hanji and Li Yuesheng, to rent warehouses for drugs, and smuggled a total of 437.35 kg of drugs abroad. Mo Keliang and Liu Hanji were sentenced to death and stripped of political rights. All their property was confiscated. The court also heard that since February 2001, the 33-year-old Deng Weiming, a native of Shaoyang city in central-south China's Hunan province, together with a fellow townsman, Chou Shuangxi, smuggled a total of 535 g of drugs.
Deng and Chou were caught by police while making a deal on April 8, 2001. Chou told police that two others, Zhu Dinghua and Wang Jiakuan, both from Luohu district in Shenzhen, were also involved in the smuggling.
The court announced death penalty for Deng Weiming and death penalty with a two-year reprieve for Wang Jiakuan, and both were stripped of political rights with all their property confiscated.Fifteen other people in the three cases were given prison terms ranging up to life imprisonment.