By Li Song, Huang Jie of the Legal Daily and Wu Meng, an intern of the Legal Daily,
An employee at a bank branch office who fled 11 years ago after defrauding customers of RMB 60.5 million by means of "high interest rate on deposits" eventually could not escape legal punishment. When standing in the dock, he said, "I am quite calm. I know that this day is bound to come."
Recently, Guo Qunsuo who has just turned 68 was brought to the defendant's stand for allegedly committing financial instrument fraud. In court, he appeared "slow in speech, with white hair, looking old". It was this person who between August 1997 and January 1998 deceived three state-owned enterprises and public institutions out of a total of RMB 60.5 million by means of offering high interest rates on deposits and using forged fixed-term deposit certificates of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. After the case came to light in February 1998, he went into hiding until he was captured last June. However, only more than RMB 42 million of the over RMB 60 million ill-gotten gains were recovered.
A small employee colludes inside and outside
To conduct big business of soliciting deposits at high interest rates
Guo Qunsuo used to be a clerk at the Dong Chang'an Street Branch Office of Beijing Branch of a certain bank and was also the head of the capital department of that branch office. According to what Guo Qunsuo confessed, it was not him but his colleague Huang Mou (also a bank employee) who had the idea of making money by means of "high interest rate on deposits".
It is understood that around 1997, so-called "high interest rate on deposits" promotional tactics were not uncommon in the financial market. Many banks launched similar marketing models to solicit businesses, which provided opportunities for people like Guo Qunsuo.
Huang Mou who first spotted this "business opportunity" took the initiative to approach Guo Qunsuo who had the convenience of such a position, hoping to "cooperate" to make profits together. After winning Guo Qunsuo's support, Huang Mou contacted Qian Mou, vice president of a company, who was responsible for soliciting businesses externally.
After careful planning, the three started their operation. Qian Mou solicited "customers" externally by falsely claiming that he could arrange high interest rate deposits. When there were really units willing to do this business, they would all be taken to the branch office where Guo Qunsuo worked and would fill in the so-called deposit slips under Guo Qunsuo's guidance. In fact, the deposit slips that Guo Qunsuo helped the customers fill in were all forged beforehand.
In order to prevent customers from finding out, Guo Qunsuo repeatedly resorted to tricks. During the process when customers filled in the deposit slips, he always claimed that the customers filled them in incorrectly or improperly and voluntarily offered to help the customers fill them in. Seeing that Guo Qunsuo was a bank staff member, the customers often trusted him very much and were willing to "fully entrust" him.
The fake deposit slips filled in by Guo Qunsuo looked no different from real ones, with endorsements and seals all complete. But the biggest difference between the two was that the bank did not know about these deposits because these deposits were not actually recorded.
According to Guo Qunsuo, through their coordinated operations, the accumulated deposits defrauded before the case broke reached RMB 60.5 million, of which about RMB 20 million directly flowed into Qian Mou's company via Guo Qunsuo and was used for "replacing loans with deposits", while another part was used by Huang Mou and Guo Qunsuo for stock trading. At that time, he and Huang Mou, Qian Mou and others agreed that one year later, after Huang Mou and Qian Mou made money from doing business, they would return other people's deposits and then give him RMB 1 million.
However, Guo Qunsuo did not wait for the million-yuan benefit to arrive but instead waited for the news of the case breaking.
11-year secluded life
Facing legal punishment calmly
Shen Li, a prosecutor of the Second Branch of the Beijing Municipal People's Procuratorate which handled this case, told reporters of the Legal Daily that at that time, state-owned enterprises and public institutions often had part of the funds allocated by their superiors lying idle, and according to policy, these funds could not be invested and could only be deposited in the bank. For them, so-called "high interest rate on deposits" was undoubtedly a great temptation.
In February 1998, during internal financial reorganization, two finance personnel from one of the state-owned enterprises and public institutions came to the bank to verify the deposit. When the bank counter said that there was no such deposit slip, they found Guo Qunsuo again. At this point, Guo Qunsuo still calmly told them that there was nothing wrong with the deposit, that he would check what went wrong, and assured them that he would handle it himself. After sending them away, Guo Qunsuo did not have peace for many days. Two days later, this unit called the branch office where Guo Qunsuo was located. When the bank called Guo Qunsuo to verify, he realized that the truth could no longer be concealed.
That night, Guo Qunsuo did not dare to go home. Before disappearing, he made a phone call to the branch manager. Although the manager repeatedly persuaded him not to run away and to solve the problem, Guo Qunsuo, like a frightened bird, kept shouting that once he went back, he would end up in jail. Thereafter, Guo Qunsuo abandoned his wife and several sons and began his 11-year fugitive life.
For the entire 11 years, Guo Qunsuo lived incognito in the suburban counties of Beijing using a false identity. During this period, he never contacted his original family. Even during his escape, he had a cohabiting girlfriend.
On June 13, 2009, while playing mahjong in a chess and card room near his temporary residence in Daxing, several policemen suddenly entered the room for inspection. In fact, these policemen were stationed there for another case and required everyone present to show their identification documents. Facing the policemen he had evaded for over ten years, Guo Qunsuo thought for a moment, stood up, and voluntarily walked to the door of the chess and card room, confessing his crimes and the fact of his escape to the policemen. Afterwards, he calmly followed the police's instructions and got into the police car.
At this point, of the RMB 60.5 million obtained by Guo Qunsuo and others through fraud, more than RMB 42 million had been recovered. The money invested in the stock market by Guo Qunsuo and others happened to coincide with a bull market, increasing by several million yuan compared to the original principal. However, the money invested in Qian Mou's company, nearly RMB 20 million, was used by the company to repay debts and invest, and this company had declared bankruptcy several years ago.
According to the Legal Daily reporter's understanding, the People's Bank of China issued an "Urgent Notice on Resolutely Stopping and Seriously Investigating High Interest Rate Solicitation of Deposits" on March 18, 1998, to curb the unhealthy competition among various banks in the financial market at that time to solicit deposits at high interest rates. In the financial market at that time, Qian Mou's "replacing loans with deposits" in the Guo Suqun case was a derivative of high interest rate solicitation of deposits and was a semi-public "jargon" in the financial market at that time, referred to as the "off-balance-sheet circulation" of bank capital.
Shen Li introduced that Guo Qunsuo was not an exception 11 years ago. At that time, a large number of bank employees were suspected of violating laws for various reasons, all due to the irregularities in the financial market at that time. With the good order of the current financial market, such cases are unlikely to happen again.
Currently, the case involving Guo Qunsuo's alleged financial instrument fraud is still under further trial.