Former “Heaven on Earth” boss and Chinese tycoon Tan Hui will face sentencing on May 9, when he will fill out the I-407 form to renounce his green card obtained through fraud. On the day of sentencing, Tan Hui will be escorted to the airport by federal agents and immediately deported. The specific country of deportation will depend on his valid passport and that country’s immigration regulations, but China is not included.
Tan Hui’s first wife is Lin Jing, the niece of Madame Lin Jiamei, the wife of former Chinese President Li Xiannian. He had extensive contacts with Liu Yazhou, son-in-law of Li Xiannian and a senior Chinese Air Force general. His second wife, Liu Duo, is a member of the Asian Affairs Advisory Committee to the New York City mayor under the leadership of Zheng Qirong. Tan Hui admitted to engaging in straw donor fundraising during the mayoral campaign of current New York City Mayor Adams and providing false information to election oversight agencies.
Tan Hui pleaded guilty on March 18 this year to multiple crimes, including making campaign donations under false names, immigration fraud, and producing counterfeit identity documents. Since his arrest on October 2 last year, he has been held at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, sharing a building with another Chinese billionaire exile, Guo Wengui.
Yesterday (April 19), the prosecution submitted written statements recommending an additional two-year supervised release period after sentencing, and requested that Tan Hui “comply and follow all instructions from immigration authorities” and “not illegally re-enter the United States without permission.” The prosecutor pointed out that although Tan Hui will be immediately deported, “his multiple fraudulent activities indicate the necessity of a two-year supervised release period to prevent him from attempting to re-enter the country illegally under false pretenses.”
Tan Hui’s lawyers submitted a 28-page sentencing memorandum, with support letters from three individuals, including his brother-in-law Qu Jifa, Xu Maodong, Chairman of the Board of Star River World Group based on Long Island, and a neurologist.
After his arrest last year, Tan Hui hired nine lawyers, including New York super lawyer Henry E. Mazurek and former federal assistant prosecutor James Miskiewicz. He currently has six lawyers.
The sentencing memorandum submitted by Tan Hui’s lawyers detailed his personal history, including his childhood experiences during the Cultural Revolution, the passing of his first wife, his business ventures, and his marriage to Liu Duo and relocation to New York.
It recounted that Tan Hui’s childhood was spent in the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution. His father was a soldier and was sent to serve in Beijing during the revolution. Due to China’s household registration system, Tan Hui moved with his father from Sichuan to Beijing, while his mother and siblings remained in Sichuan. When he arrived in Beijing at the age of six, his father’s frequent absence due to military duties left his life filled with uncertainty and loneliness, especially during the most turbulent times in Beijing, when strangers cared for him. Later, he reunited with his mother and siblings in Sichuan.
Subsequently, he returned to Beijing to attend university, but his university life did not last long. In his second year, in June 1989, the student movement at Tiananmen Square erupted, leading to the suspension of classes and students returning home, after which he never returned to complete his studies.
Tan Hui had known his first wife, Lin Jing, since primary school. Lin Jing was the daughter of the younger brother of Lin Jiamei, the wife of former Chinese President Li Xiannian. Tan Hui and Lin Jing married in 1992, and upon returning to Beijing, Tan Hui founded the famous luxury nightclub “Heaven on Earth.”
In 1996, Lin Jing passed away, and Tan Hui sent his niece, who was still learning to walk, to the United States with his sister. He restarted the nightclub in Beijing and used it as a starting point to establish SMI Holdings Ltd in 2001, a multimedia company that initially operated a chain of cinemas in China. He later took the company public and expanded its business scope to include film production, film studios, and program production. Before the global pandemic outbreak, the company employed over 20,000 people, with Tan Hui as the founder and major shareholder of the company.
The memorandum mentioned that Tan Hui had close ties with his first wife’s family, and after her passing from a brain aneurysm, he continued to support her elderly parents.
In 2010, Tan Hui married Liu Duo, and the family relocated to New York. Tan Hui conducted numerous charitable activities in the Long Island community using his influence and wealth. Tan Hui’s friend, Xu Maodong, stated in a support letter that Tan Hui donated over $1.5 million to Long Island schools and made substantial contributions to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. As reported by Sing Tao Daily and World Journal in 2021, Liu Duo was the only Chinese-American director on the boards of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Association and Green Vale School.
Under the leadership of Mayor Adams’ aide Zheng Qirong, Liu Duo served as a member of the Mayor’s Asian Affairs Advisory Committee in New York City. In November of last year, the New York City Investigation Bureau began to investigate Zheng Qirong’s conduct; in February of this year, the FBI raided Zheng Qirong’s two residences in the Bronx. Tan Hui admitted to providing illegal political donations to politicians like Adams in his personal name since 2021.
However, the sentencing memorandum claimed that Tan Hui engaged in illegal political donations due to facing huge debts and multiple lawsuits to “maintain the appearance of dignity” in economic hardship: “In dire financial straits, Tan Hui endeavored to maintain his and Liu Duo’s status in society, thus engaging in ‘straw donations.'”
Tan Hui is seen as a member of the Beijing elite due to his relationship with the Li Xiannian family. Mainland Chinese media commonly report his flamboyant behavior, well-known among the elite circle. However, in the sentencing memorandum written by his lawyers, he is portrayed as a victim of the Chinese Communist Party.
The memorandum stated: “He is not seen as an ally of the government. His first wife comes from a family closely associated with political opposition. His first wife’s aunt’s son-in-law (Chinese Air Force General Liu Yazhou) was sentenced to life imprisonment for inciting rebellion.”
Tan Hui’s lawyers also mentioned that due to his family background and the substantial wealth accumulated through SMI cinema business in the mid-2000s, he harbored concerns about China’s security. Therefore, he obtained Hong Kong residency under the pseudonym Li Mulin to protect himself and his family.
According to the prosecutor’s indictment, in 2008, a Chinese government official provided Tan Hui with the pseudonym “Li Mulin,” including a Hong Kong identity card, a Chinese identity card, and a Hong Kong passport, with Tan’s photo on them, but with a different birth date. In September 2017, Tan Hui transferred over $5 million from China to Liu Duo’s US bank account using the pseudonym Li Mulin, part of which was used to purchase his luxury Manhattan apartment.
The sentencing memorandum also highlighted that the pandemic and China’s “zero-COVID” policy dealt a significant blow to Tan Hui’s media company, leading to bankruptcy and significant financial difficulties for him personally. Additionally, his personal debts continued to increase, with his assets being seized in multiple jurisdictions, and creditors seeking to enforce judgments from Beijing arbitration courts in the US. Faced with these pressures, his wife Liu Duo filed for divorce, causing their family to fall apart.
At the time of his arrest, Tan Hui and Liu Duo were separated, facing massive debts and multiple lawsuits. He was involved in civil litigation in New York and the British Virgin Islands, once again falling into hardship.
He mentioned going through three major blows: first, the death of his first wife when he was 28; then the global pandemic that destroyed his business empire; and finally, being permanently deported from the United States, separated from his three children living there.
Finally, Tan Hui described his difficult life at the MDC Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. He was confined in a small cell, restricted in activities for suspicion of contraband, unable to leave the cell (two sections of the document were redacted). Other prisoners reported finding maggots and other insects in the food.
“He endured seven months, physically and mentally exhausted,” the lawyer said. He requested on Tan Hui’s behalf to be expelled “as soon as possible,” hoping to leave the US before the end of April. The prosecution had no objections. However, in the end, the judge only allowed him to be sentenced a day earlier than the original date of May 10 and deported.
Judge Joan M. Azrack is scheduled to sentence Tan Hui at noon on May 9 in Room 920 of the Eastern District Federal Court in Long Island.