中國富豪吳立勝多次申請推遲服刑

When Ng Lap Seng, a Chinese billionaire, was sentenced to four years in prison in May in a wide-ranging bribery case, the judge gave him two months — until July 10 — to begin serving his time.

今年5月，中國的億萬富翁吳立勝因一起大范圍的賄賂案被判處四年刑期，法官給了他兩個月的時間，到7月10日開始服刑。

But as that date approached, Mr. Ng’s lawyers asked the judge for two additional months, to give Mr. Ng “sufficient time to get his complex business affairs in order.”

但隨著那個日期的臨近，吳立勝的律師要求該法官再給他兩個月的時間，以便“有足夠的時間安排好復雜的商業(yè)事務(wù)”。

The government objected, arguing that Mr. Ng, 70, was trying “to put off prison as long as possible on the ground that he is a successful businessman.”

政府對此表示反對，認為70歲的吳立勝想要“以自己是成功商人為由，盡可能久地推遲服刑”。

“That request is unwarranted, inequitable and should be denied,” a prosecutor wrote.

檢察官寫道：“這個要求毫無根據(jù)、不公平，應(yīng)該予以拒絕。”

The judge, Vernon S. Broderick of Federal District Court in Manhattan, denied Mr. Ng’s request for a two-month delay, but a new dispute has arisen, over whether Mr. Ng may postpone his surrender for medical reasons.

曼哈頓聯(lián)邦地區(qū)法院法官弗農(nóng)·S·布羅德里克(Vernon S. Broderick)拒絕了吳立勝的請求，但接著又出現(xiàn)了他是否能以身體狀況為由推遲服刑的爭議。

Mr. Ng’s wealth — he is said to be worth $1.8 billion — has been an issue since his arrest in September 2015. When he was taken into custody, he was wearing a gold watch, encrusted in diamonds and worth about $200,000, prosecutors said then. His lawyers sought to have him released into a kind of self-financed home detention — a gilded cage, some have called it — a form of bail only a few federal judges in Manhattan have agreed to in recent years.

自2015年9月被捕以來，吳立勝的財產(chǎn)一直是一個問題;據(jù)說他的身家達到18億美元。檢方當時稱，他在被捕的時候，戴著一塊鑲有鉆石、價值約20萬美元的金表。他的律師尋求將他釋放，而采取一種自費的家庭軟禁形式——有些人稱之為鍍金的籠子，這是近些年只有少數(shù)曼哈頓的法官同意采取的一種保釋形式。

Nearly a decade ago, Judge Jed S. Rakoff granted the prominent lawyer Marc S. Dreier a $10 million bond pending trial and allowed him to remain in his East Side apartment, secured by electronic monitoring and armed security guards, paid for by his family. He later pleaded guilty to leading a scheme that defrauded investors of $700 million.

差不多10年前，法官杰德·S·雷科夫(Jed S. Rakoff)同意著名律師馬克·S·德雷爾(Marc S. Dreier)繳納1000萬美元的保釋金待審，并允許他留在位于東區(qū)的寓所內(nèi)，由電子監(jiān)控和武裝保安人員看守，費用由他的家人來出。后來，他承認領(lǐng)導了一個詐騙投資者7億美元的計劃。

“Many kinds of bail conditions favor the rich,” Judge Rakoff wrote, adding that conversely, many defendants were too poor to afford “even the most modest of bail bonds or financial conditions of release.”

“許多保釋條件都偏向有錢人，”雷科夫法官寫道，并且反過來許多被告則太窮，連“最少的保釋金和釋放的財物條件”都負擔不起。

“This is a serious flaw in our system,” the judge said. “But it is not a reason to deny a constitutional right to someone who, for whatever reason, can provide reasonable assurances against flight.”

“這是我們制度的一個嚴重缺陷，”這名法官說。“但對于那些可以提供不逃跑的合理保證的人來說，這不是否決憲法權(quán)利的理由。”

In 2016, Judge Richard M. Berman denied a similar request from Reza Zarrab, a Turkish-Iranian gold trader charged with conspiring to violate Iranian sanctions.

2016年，法官理查德·M. 貝爾曼(Richard M. Berman)拒絕了土耳其-伊朗黃金交易員禮薩·扎拉布(Reza Zarrab)的類似請求，他被控陰謀違反對伊朗的制裁。

Ruling that Mr. Zarrab posed a risk of flight and that no conditions, including privately funded armed guards, would assure his appearance at trial, Judge Berman also found such a request “unreasonable because it helps to foster inequity and unequal treatment in favor of a very small cohort of criminal defendants who are extremely wealthy, such as Mr. Zarrab.”

法院裁定，扎拉布具備逃跑的風險，而且不存在能確保他出庭受審的條件，包括私人出錢請武裝保安，法官貝爾曼還認為，這樣的請求“不合理，因為它有助于形成對一小群非常富裕的刑事被告有利的不公平和不平等待遇”。

The government objected to Mr. Ng’s release under similar conditions. A prosecutor, Daniel C. Richenthal, argued that Mr. Ng had access to private airplanes, foreign passports and was a risk to flee. “Fifty-million-dollar bond is meaningless to him; $20 million is meaningless to him,” Mr. Richenthal said.

政府也反對在類似條件下釋放吳立勝。檢察官丹尼爾·里辰塔爾(Daniel C. Richenthal)認為，吳立勝有私人飛機和外國護照，存在逃跑的危險。“5000萬美元的保釋金對他來說不算什么;2000萬美元對他來說不算什么，”里辰塔爾說。

Judge Broderick, concluding there were conditions that could assure Mr. Ng’s appearance in court, granted Mr. Ng a $50 million bond, secured by $20 million in cash, and ordered “home detention” in an apartment at 240 East 47th Street, subject to GPS monitoring and an armed security team, at his own expense.

法官布羅德里克判定，確保吳立勝出庭的前提條件是存在的，批準他繳納5000萬美元的保釋金，2000萬美元現(xiàn)金作為押金，下令將其“軟禁”在東47街240號的一套公寓內(nèi)，由GPS監(jiān)控和武裝保安看守，費用自理。

Among other strict conditions, the judge also said Mr. Ng’s guards could use “legal force as they deem appropriate” to prevent him from fleeing.

除了其他嚴格條件，法官還表示吳立勝的警衛(wèi)可能會“使用他們看來適當?shù)暮戏α?rdquo;，保證他無法逃走。

Mr. Ng was convicted in July 2017 of bribery, money laundering and other counts, for which he received the four-year sentence and was told to surrender on July 10. 吳立勝2017年7月被判賄賂、洗錢及其他幾項罪名成立，他被判四年監(jiān)禁，并且被告知于7月10日向當局自首。

But last month, his lawyers asked for the delay until Sept. 10. They said Mr. Ng “helms a vast network of real estate businesses in China with many employees and a diverse portfolio of holdings worth billions of dollars.”

但上個月。他的律師要求將該日期推遲至9月10日。他們表示吳立勝“在中國掌管著龐大的房地產(chǎn)商業(yè)網(wǎng)絡(luò)，擁有眾多員工，持有的多種資產(chǎn)價值數(shù)十億美元”。

He had been “working diligently to arrange for the management of his business while he is incarcerated,” one lawyer, George N. Bauer, wrote.

一位名為喬治·N·鮑爾(George N. Bauer)的律師寫道，他還“在遭到監(jiān)禁期間勤奮工作，安排他的企業(yè)管理事宜”。

In particular, he said, Mr. Ng was in the final stages of lengthy negotiations concerning a $10 billion real estate project that was expected to create 10,000 jobs and had made “significant progress” but was “entering the most complex and precarious stage of the negotiations.”

他說，尤其是吳立勝正處于一個曠日持久談判的最后階段，這個談判關(guān)乎于一個100億美元的房地產(chǎn)項目，該項目預計能創(chuàng)造一萬個工作崗位，已經(jīng)取得“重大進展”，但“談判正在進入最為復雜、危險的階段”。

Objecting to the delay, Mr. Richenthal, the prosecutor, wrote that Mr. Ng’s “vast network of real estate businesses” did not entitle him to “special treatment with respect to surrender.” Mr. Bauer responded that Mr. Ng was not seeking “special treatment.”

反對推遲的檢察官里辰塔爾寫道，吳立勝的“龐大房地產(chǎn)商業(yè)網(wǎng)絡(luò)”不能讓他“在向當局自首方面獲得特殊待遇”。鮑爾的回應(yīng)稱吳立勝沒有在尋求獲得“特殊待遇”。

The judge denied the request on June 25, the same day Mr. Ng’s lawyers reported that Mr. Ng had been taken the evening before to the emergency room, suffering from severe back pain.

法官于6月25日拒絕了該項請求，同一天，吳立勝的律師們報告稱他前一晚由于劇烈的背痛，去了急診室。

Recently, Mr. Ng’s lawyers asked that he be allowed to seek treatment for a range of afflictions, including “recent recurrent and unpredictable headaches” and pain in other parts of his body. He had stents implanted in two coronary arteries and, his lawyers said, he had suffered a small stroke.

近期，吳立勝的律師們要求允許他尋求對一系列病痛的治療，包括“近期不斷發(fā)作、無法預知的頭痛”以及身體其他部位的疼痛。他的律師表示，吳立勝曾出現(xiàn)過輕微中風，他的兩個冠狀動脈植入過支架。

Prosecutors, in a letter to the judge, questioned the “timing and sincerity” of Mr. Ng’s claims of headaches and pain, and suggested he was “using his wealth and connections” to gain further delays. They submitted a letter from the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which said it could provide Mr. Ng with “the necessary and appropriate care.”

在寫給法官的信中，檢察官們對吳立勝宣稱頭痛和身體疼痛的“時機和誠實性”提出疑問，并且暗示他“是在利用自己的財富和人脈關(guān)系”獲得更多推遲。他們提交了一份來自聯(lián)邦監(jiān)獄局的信，上面表示能夠為吳立勝提供“必要且適當?shù)恼樟?rdquo;。

Judge Broderick, who granted several short extensions of Mr. Ng’s surrender date on medical grounds cited by his lawyers, has ordered a hearing for Monday at which he will consider Mr. Ng’s latest request that his surrender be delayed until July 23.

布羅德里克法官多次準許吳立勝以其律師所說的醫(yī)療理由延遲向當局自首的時間，他下令周一舉行一場聆訊，屆時他將考慮吳立勝最新提出的將自首時間推遲至7月23日的請求。