Speaker 1: This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2: Every twelve years the Year of the Dragon. This year
Speaker 2: is again the Year of the Dragon, is supposed to
Speaker 2: be a year of political instability because Dragon symbolized China,
Speaker 2: a symbolized prosperity, and also symbolized lot the turbulence.
Speaker 3: I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, a nonfiction author and journalism professor
Speaker 3: in Austin, Texas.
Speaker 1: I'm also the co host of the.
Speaker 3: Podcast Buried Bones on Exactly Right, and throughout my career,
Speaker 3: research for my many audio and book projects has taken
Speaker 3: me around the world. On Wicked Words, I sit down
Speaker 3: with the people I've met along the way, amazing writers, journalists, filmmakers,
Speaker 3: and podcasters who have investigated and reported on notorious crime cases.
Speaker 3: This is about the choices writers make, both good and bad,
Speaker 3: and it's a deep dive into the unpublished details behind
Speaker 3: their stories. A murder conspiracy in China is at the
Speaker 3: center of a fascinating true crime story involving politics, greed,
Speaker 3: and deception. There are no heroes in this book, but boy,
Speaker 3: what a drama. Author Win Wang Hong tells me about
Speaker 3: his fantastic book A death in the Lucky Holiday Hotel, murder, money,
Speaker 3: and an epic power struggle in China. Let's start first
Speaker 3: with this is twenty eleven when this murder happens, right
Speaker 3: and where in China? Will you tell me where we
Speaker 3: are in China and kind of the brief overview of
Speaker 3: what's happening with politics there, and maybe kind of where
Speaker 3: we are just in general.
Speaker 2: This was happening in mid November two thousand and eleven,
Speaker 2: and we are right now in the middle of China's
Speaker 2: One of China's mega city is called chung Qing in
Speaker 2: southwestern part of China. It has thirty two million people,
Speaker 2: so it's a huge city. Is sitting near the Yans River.
Speaker 2: If people who are listeners will know about the three
Speaker 2: gorgeous that one of the biggest rivers in China.
Speaker 4: This city is right there.
Speaker 2: And then in chung Qing city and the head of
Speaker 2: the city in the US called the mayor. In China
Speaker 2: we call the party secretary of chu Qing, which is
Speaker 2: the number one thick of the city. And then he
Speaker 2: himself is a princely, which means he was the son
Speaker 2: of a senior commons party leader. So he had taken
Speaker 2: over about five years ago. And then the wife also
Speaker 2: came from a very prominent family.
Speaker 4: She was a lawyer.
Speaker 2: So this is the background, and the city was going
Speaker 2: through a very dramatic change, as you know that China
Speaker 2: after nineteen seventy six, after mild died, it went through
Speaker 2: a very big market reform and then was tilted more
Speaker 2: toward the west. And then as the market reform was
Speaker 2: going on, and then there were also the problems started occur.
Speaker 2: For example, the rich get richer and the poor get poor,
Speaker 2: the gap between the reach and the poor. Prime rates
Speaker 2: have gone up. And then so this mayor came in,
Speaker 2: or the party secretary called war. He came in and
Speaker 2: he implemented a series of programs against organized crimes and
Speaker 2: that he wanted to return China to the old Commings
Speaker 2: era and a lot of people, common people, they love it.
Speaker 2: So this is against this background this murder happened. So
Speaker 2: on November sixteenth or seventeenth of twenty eleven, and then
Speaker 2: there was a hotel right outside the downtown of chung Qing.
Speaker 2: We heard about chun Qing Express that's the same city,
Speaker 2: the mega city in southwest China. In this hotel, I
Speaker 2: actually visited the hotel in twenty twelve. On the surface
Speaker 2: is a regular like a two or three star hotel
Speaker 2: with a very goudy like a motel type of things.
Speaker 2: You imagine walking there, the big Chinese fish tank, and
Speaker 2: then some people lying around. But outside in the periphery
Speaker 2: of the hotel, in the vicinity of the hotel, there
Speaker 2: were twelve European style little townhouses, the villas. There's a
Speaker 2: lot of privacy and then businesses. If you want to
Speaker 2: have a we can get away, you can stay there,
Speaker 2: or sometimes you have business meetings. It's a very secluded
Speaker 2: area right on top of the mountain, so it's a
Speaker 2: very secluded area. And then on that day and then
Speaker 2: the people who were working at the hotel, they noticed
Speaker 2: that in room sixteen oh five there was a sign
Speaker 2: do not disturb sign on but the cleaning staff reported
Speaker 2: that nobody has gone into the hotel room for about
Speaker 2: two or three day. They didn't see anybody coming out,
Speaker 2: and the only thing they saw that was three nights ago.
Speaker 2: And then they were the man, a foreign man and
Speaker 2: also a Chinese woman. They walked into the hotel into
Speaker 2: that room, and then the woman left, but the man
Speaker 2: never left.
Speaker 4: See what was happening. So they knocked on the door.
Speaker 2: There was nobody in the door, said finally, they called
Speaker 2: the security.
Speaker 4: They opened the door.
Speaker 2: They found the body of a foreigner, a westerner, and
Speaker 2: then after they checked the registration, they found out he
Speaker 2: was a busishman with the Beijing residential card. He looked
Speaker 2: in the capital city of China, Beijing. So the immediate
Speaker 2: called the police, and police came and then they notified
Speaker 2: the police chief of the city, called one the police chief.
Speaker 2: He came over and he looked around and he assigned
Speaker 2: the case to four of his trusted police officers, and
Speaker 2: then they did a round of the investigations and then
Speaker 2: they realized. They said he died of excessive drinking, and
Speaker 2: that he was a British businessman called Neil Haywood. He
Speaker 2: had a consulting business and then obviously he drank too
Speaker 2: much and then he might have died of a heart attack.
Speaker 2: So they noticed his wife. He married the Chinese national.
Speaker 2: They have two children, so the wife was very sad.
Speaker 2: But then they also notified his family in the UK
Speaker 2: and his mother heard about that. She was really shocked
Speaker 2: because Neil Heywood's father had just died of a heart
Speaker 2: attack not long ago, so they normally think that when
Speaker 2: he drank, excess drinking led to a heart attack. So
Speaker 2: they have the family signed the death papers everything, and
Speaker 2: then they had the body permitted right away.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: The conclusion was that he just simply died of excess drinking,
Speaker 2: and then nobody talked about it, and then they sent
Speaker 2: the ashses back to Beijing to his wife, and then
Speaker 2: for a while it sounds like the case was settled.
Speaker 2: But there was a Chinese phrase you probably heard in China.
Speaker 2: There is if you see the movie Goes in the US, right.
Speaker 2: Chinese have similar sayings saying that if somebody was wrongfully
Speaker 2: killed or murdered, and then their ghosts wouldn't dissipate, They
Speaker 2: would rack public in this world until they would avenge
Speaker 2: their own death, until all people know about it. There
Speaker 2: was a lot of the Asian Chinese stories talk about
Speaker 2: the ghosts that on death stuff.
Speaker 4: So people would say.
Speaker 2: Neil, he would died a wrongful death or something, and
Speaker 2: then his goals never dissipated, and then several months later
Speaker 2: this whole case started unravel.
Speaker 1: Well. I have several questions.
Speaker 3: Did the media think that this was a big story
Speaker 3: in any way that this business is Western businessman. This
Speaker 3: British businessman has died in a hotel. This was a
Speaker 3: non story I guess for them.
Speaker 2: Yes, because first thing is media in China was very
Speaker 2: tightly controlled by the government. They all stayed round media
Speaker 2: right and also the Chunching police department. They never notified
Speaker 2: the media, so there wasn't much report about it. The
Speaker 2: second part is there were so many foreigners living in
Speaker 2: China at that time, so if it's the excessive drinking
Speaker 2: and then never caused a major headline, it just a
Speaker 2: foreigner died, and normally China try lay down the death
Speaker 2: because they didn't want to cause any international incident. It's
Speaker 2: just a normal death. So there wasn't much reporting at all.
Speaker 2: Other people they never heard about the case, and I
Speaker 2: never heard about it until after later on when this
Speaker 2: whole case exploded for some other reasons. But nobody knew
Speaker 2: anything about it. It just went away.
Speaker 3: What did you know about Neil Haywood? Can you give
Speaker 3: me an idea of who he was as a person.
Speaker 3: You said he was married, he was in Beijing, he
Speaker 3: had two children. Was there any reason to believe that
Speaker 3: this was an important man or this was consequential in
Speaker 3: any way.
Speaker 2: At that time, all we knew that he was born
Speaker 2: in the UK and attended one of the prestigious they
Speaker 2: called public schools in the UK, Herald School there. And
Speaker 2: then he graduated from University Warwick with a degree on
Speaker 2: internatural relations.
Speaker 4: And then he claimed.
Speaker 2: That his grandparents of great grandparents serving the House of
Speaker 2: Lord and then used in the nineteen thirties his great
Speaker 2: grandfather served as a council General of the British Mission
Speaker 2: in China. So because of this connection he came to
Speaker 2: China in the nineteen nineties. You know, a lot of
Speaker 2: foreigners students after graduated, they traveled to Japan China to
Speaker 2: teach English as a second foreign language. So he didn't
Speaker 2: come to major city like Beijing, Shanghai or the cities
Speaker 2: that people normally know.
Speaker 4: He ended up in the city called Dhalian.
Speaker 2: In northeastern part of China, in the man Turian part
Speaker 2: of China. The dani And city is a it's a
Speaker 2: seaport city, so he went over there and started to
Speaker 2: teach English. In those days, it was very popular a
Speaker 2: lot of the Chinese, especially the fund families, They wanted
Speaker 2: to send their children abroad to study because getting a
Speaker 2: degree in the US in Britain is.
Speaker 4: Called gold plated, is much more marketable.
Speaker 2: So they want their especially some of the upper class Chinese,
Speaker 2: they want their kids to be sent to a British
Speaker 2: boarding school. And then they want their kids to grow
Speaker 2: up with standard speak English, with better than I deal,
Speaker 2: with a no accent, and with the Queen's English. You
Speaker 2: know that stuff. So he had attracted a lot of
Speaker 2: the students there. And we also learned later on when
Speaker 2: one of the senior leader's kids they went to send
Speaker 2: to London, he offered to help.
Speaker 4: And if he know a lot of the upper class people.
Speaker 2: Once he knew more and more of the senior leaders
Speaker 2: and got into their circle, and if he studied his
Speaker 2: own consultant business helping people. For example, he was saying,
Speaker 2: if a British businessman or a company in the US,
Speaker 2: you want to do a set up business in China,
Speaker 2: he was supposed to be very well versed in Chinese cultures.
Speaker 2: He could offer consulting business. So that was his background
Speaker 2: at that time. And then you know, there was a
Speaker 2: lot of people like him, a lot of people who
Speaker 2: came to China to teach English. And if somebody died
Speaker 2: of accidentals like excessive drinking. That was no non news,
Speaker 2: and then the state controlled media never reported.
Speaker 3: So this happens in mid November of twenty eleven. What
Speaker 3: is the next thing that happens when we realized that
Speaker 3: this was not somebody who drank himself to death.
Speaker 2: In February right after Chinese New Year? You know Chinese
Speaker 2: New Year happened that year two thousand, Well happened in
Speaker 2: late January. So right after Chinese New Year, the very
Speaker 2: powerful police chief who was in charge of investigation, suddenly
Speaker 2: he lost his job and then he was removed from
Speaker 2: his place. They said he would become the deputy mayor.
Speaker 2: And later on they said he suffered a lot of
Speaker 2: stress because he was receiving a kind of vacational style treatment.
Speaker 2: So become a joke, said, what happened to the police
Speaker 2: chief who was so powerful? He was a police He
Speaker 2: established himself as one of the crime fighters. He came
Speaker 2: from a different city in two thousand and seven to
Speaker 2: assist the party secretary or the mayor of chung Kin,
Speaker 2: and then he within a few years he estabbed himself
Speaker 2: up the true crime fighter. He arrested more than five
Speaker 2: thousand people prosecuted them for being involved in an organized crime,
Speaker 2: and he was very, very famous. And suddenly in February
Speaker 2: two thousand and twelve he lost his job. People couldn't
Speaker 2: figure out what was the reason. And then they said
Speaker 2: he was and a lot of stress because it's so
Speaker 2: much of an anti crime work.
Speaker 4: His mental health was affected, so it.
Speaker 2: Costs a little bit of distir That's how my co
Speaker 2: author of the book found out. We found out. We
Speaker 2: realized it was a little pretty intriguing what happened. And
Speaker 2: then a few days later and then some day on
Speaker 2: social media started to say who lived near the American
Speaker 2: embassy in Sutram Province. It's about twenty kilometers away in
Speaker 2: another city where the American constule was based. People suddenly
Speaker 2: realized there was a lot of cars surrounding an American embassy.
Speaker 2: Was there, VIP coming, they're welcoming. And also this was
Speaker 2: a week before the Chinese Vice president was supposed to
Speaker 2: go to visit the US, so the US China relationship
Speaker 2: was at the focal point. Everybody was very sised about
Speaker 2: the issue. This what's happened to the American constule?
Speaker 4: They there?
Speaker 2: And then that night somebody said, the police chief has
Speaker 2: defected and escaped to the American embassy to seek for
Speaker 2: political asylum. Oh that's exactly the reaction a lot of people,
Speaker 2: they said, what this guy who is famous for being
Speaker 2: his anti western, anti American rhetoric, and he's very on
Speaker 2: the leftist side, and you know, how could this anti
Speaker 2: American police chief in China ended up in the American embassy.
Speaker 2: So that caused a huge skir and after he got
Speaker 2: in and then the party chief or the mayor of
Speaker 2: tun King got so panicky, so he sent troops over
Speaker 2: and tried to kidnap him and try to bring him
Speaker 2: out of the American embassy. And then the news reached Beijing,
Speaker 2: the capital city, and the central government they heard about this.
Speaker 2: They were so embarrassed because if a local government sent
Speaker 2: troops to kidnap somebody from the American embassy, that's a
Speaker 2: violation of international law. So they end up sending troops
Speaker 2: over to the American embassy. So that night, so the
Speaker 2: American embassy, the marine troops were ready to fight, and
Speaker 2: then the Chinese provincial troops surrounding the American embassy, and
Speaker 2: then the government central governments and the troops start worrying
Speaker 2: that the provincial government was going to take over the
Speaker 2: American counsulate.
Speaker 4: So because this tension going on, they said what is happening?
Speaker 4: That caused the whole chaos there.
Speaker 2: And then the next day you start to leak out
Speaker 2: saying that this police chief had information about the death
Speaker 2: of the British businessman Neil Haywood. And then gradually you
Speaker 2: sleaked out as this police chief suspected or accused the
Speaker 2: wife of the party chief, Chang Ching or the mayor
Speaker 2: of chang Jing, of murdering this British businessman. And then
Speaker 2: he was seeking political asylum because he was worried that
Speaker 2: he had the information and the party chief was going
Speaker 2: to send people to assassinate him, to kill him. That's
Speaker 2: why he ran to the American embassy. And then the
Speaker 2: American officials there they were put in the dilemma because
Speaker 2: on the one hand, they really want to maintain good
Speaker 2: relations with China, because that was a week before the
Speaker 2: Chinese vice president, who was supposed to be the Crown
Speaker 2: Prince who was going to take over China seven months later,
Speaker 2: he was visiting the US. So by the those days
Speaker 2: he was the vice president, he is supposed to knew
Speaker 2: China very well. So they briefed the Chinese US ambassador
Speaker 2: to China. They briefed Hillary Clinton for the suburb of States.
Speaker 2: So they had an emergency meeting, and they decided that
Speaker 2: this police chief was probably didn't have too much valuable information,
Speaker 2: who was probably not of no value. So they decided
Speaker 2: to pander to the Chinese request.
Speaker 4: So they gave him up.
Speaker 2: So he was released from the American American compassion turned
Speaker 2: him down. They gave him to the Chinese government.
Speaker 3: I need a very small asylum seekers one oh one.
Speaker 3: He can show up to the American consulate in China,
Speaker 3: in a Chinese city and say I need asylum.
Speaker 1: And what does he do?
Speaker 3: He pleads his case and if they say yes, what
Speaker 3: happens they escort him to the United States or what
Speaker 3: ends up happening with that case if they say yes.
Speaker 4: So let me walk back a little bit. The police chief.
Speaker 2: Later it turned out that he was removed from his position.
Speaker 2: He realized that his life was going to be in
Speaker 2: danger by the police chief was gone to kill him.
Speaker 2: So because when each time they claimed somebody may have
Speaker 2: mental health issues, that's a sign that you couldn't die.
Speaker 3: Wait, what so you're saying when they say the person
Speaker 3: of some importance or controversy has mental health issues, the
Speaker 3: next step is like they disappear or they go into
Speaker 3: an asylum or something.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: The thing is, if you reports lately about Russia and China,
Speaker 2: you see a lot of people they say so and
Speaker 2: so suicide jumped from his building because for years he
Speaker 2: had mental health issues, were struggling.
Speaker 4: With the depression. So a lot of the mysterious deeff.
Speaker 2: So the police ship was worried that he could be
Speaker 2: pushed down the building or could be murdered. They would
Speaker 2: say he had mental health issues. He committed suicide, so
Speaker 2: that was he's worried that his life was in danger.
Speaker 4: So he evaded.
Speaker 2: He was put under house arrest in a way, and
Speaker 2: then the police, they actually planted a lot of policemen
Speaker 2: year his residents. Somehow he evaded the police. Some people
Speaker 2: say that he dressed up by like an old woman
Speaker 2: and then gradually left his compound and then he called
Speaker 2: another of his uhs previous bornis and somebody had the
Speaker 2: suv there waited for him, and they drove him to
Speaker 2: another city to the American consulate, and then he called
Speaker 2: the American consulate or he has his friend called the
Speaker 2: American consulate saying that he had something important. He wanted
Speaker 2: to see the consul general of the consulate, saying that
Speaker 2: there was some anti terrorist information he wanted to share
Speaker 2: with Americans. Since he was the police chief of the
Speaker 2: city and the American consulate, I'm sure they must have
Speaker 2: opened the door to him.
Speaker 4: They let him in.
Speaker 2: There's information, saying they carried a suitcase of some of
Speaker 2: the documents relating to the murder of Neil Haywood.
Speaker 4: Some of that evidence he carried. He told the American.
Speaker 2: Officials there, said, I have information relating to the murder
Speaker 2: of a British prisons man.
Speaker 4: And also I have also.
Speaker 2: Information relating to the party chief of our city. And
Speaker 2: I'm si complete asylum. And then they since he was
Speaker 2: such a heightened tension, they said he was incoherent, he
Speaker 2: was agitated.
Speaker 4: But then they sent him the room. They immediately send the.
Speaker 2: Cable to Gary Locke, who was the US and bestor
Speaker 2: of China. They said, please come back, and then they
Speaker 2: interviewed him and then the report or the State Department,
Speaker 2: and they realized that he probably wasn't valuable enough. And
Speaker 2: then he wasn't qualified to be a political refugee. And ironically,
Speaker 2: in the old days, it's American Chinese dissidents who would
Speaker 2: go to run to the American embassy or the consulate
Speaker 2: to see political asylum. And this guy is the police chief.
Speaker 2: People like the reaction you had. He said, what he's
Speaker 2: running for a lot of times people said, this is
Speaker 2: a rumor. He could have gone to the asylum. He
Speaker 2: must have gone to the American consulate to discuss some
Speaker 2: important matters with the American officials.
Speaker 4: But later on and it was true. And then when the.
Speaker 2: Party chief heard about it, he was desperate. He knew
Speaker 2: that he was going to be in trouble, so he
Speaker 2: sent the troops to the American embassy. They had the
Speaker 2: different negotiations, and then after thirty six hours of the
Speaker 2: standoffs and the Americans let him go, and then he
Speaker 2: was handed over not to the provincial government but to
Speaker 2: the central government. The troops spent outer layer yeah to
Speaker 2: the representative there, and then they flew him to Beijing
Speaker 2: for interrogation. So that's the big instant milestone. And then
Speaker 2: people start to understand that the reason he escaped to
Speaker 2: the American embassy is because Neil Heywood the death, so
Speaker 2: people start to check look up and then I think
Speaker 2: the British government also was alerted of this and they
Speaker 2: also requested investigation.
Speaker 3: I love the way that people are thinking, like they're
Speaker 3: putting together the pieces. This must be the police chief
Speaker 3: who is far left and is anti American, anti Western,
Speaker 3: and he says, save me. And you said, you know
Speaker 3: that people were connecting it to Neil Heywood in his death,
Speaker 3: which was questionable this businessman. But who are the people.
Speaker 3: It's not the media, right because the media is controlled
Speaker 3: by the Chinese government.
Speaker 4: That's a great question.
Speaker 2: Before he left for the American Embassy, the Peace Chief Wan,
Speaker 2: he prepared four cell phones with a different phone card,
Speaker 2: the same card.
Speaker 4: He prepared four cell phones.
Speaker 2: He typed the different messages in case, he said, in
Speaker 2: case I'm killed or if I something happened. He gave
Speaker 2: the cell phones to his friends and he said, will
Speaker 2: you hear that either something I'm caught or news of
Speaker 2: my death or something. Please send the message over to
Speaker 2: the different chat groups. And then so the fourth phones,
Speaker 2: the first message was like please chief one escape to
Speaker 2: the American embassy.
Speaker 4: Because he knew so much about the murder of the British.
Speaker 2: Businessman, and then another message saying that the party chief
Speaker 2: of chung Jin the city, he's very corrupt, he invents
Speaker 2: a lot of funds. And then the police knew about it.
Speaker 2: And the third some messages saying that the wife of
Speaker 2: the police chief murdered Neil Heywood. You know this stuff
Speaker 2: they set out and when the government because by the
Speaker 2: time you sent out to the chat group and by
Speaker 2: the time censors they found it, there was a period
Speaker 2: of time during this time already spread very widely. But
Speaker 2: this was all planned by the police before he entered
Speaker 2: the American and consumate there.
Speaker 3: But isn't all of that still like I know, there's
Speaker 3: the Chinese version of Twitter, right, isn't that all still
Speaker 3: very tightly controlled chat rooms too? Are they not all
Speaker 3: still tightly controlled by the Chinese government? Or is there
Speaker 3: some underground thing that I don't know about?
Speaker 2: In those days, micro crops is similar to our Twitter,
Speaker 2: it would call micro blogs plot It was controlled by
Speaker 2: the government, but sometimes they cannot control it all beca
Speaker 2: it's such a big country. It was so in those
Speaker 2: at the early age that the two thousand was not
Speaker 2: as advanced as here like right now, China has the AI,
Speaker 2: all the different control mechanisms, and there was certain kind
Speaker 2: of freedom. People use firewalls, they can use the access,
Speaker 2: they could ease the access Twitter, and also we were
Speaker 2: sometimes they send out messages and then the government the
Speaker 2: censors found out going to delete it right away. But
Speaker 2: between the time the government census found out there was
Speaker 2: like a couple of hours. It is already there. People
Speaker 2: already spread very very The new spread very fast. And
Speaker 2: that was the first time. Previously I would say that
Speaker 2: we hear or staying in the West right if something
Speaker 2: happened in China, even some of the senior officials died,
Speaker 2: we might probably hear about it a week later or
Speaker 2: two weeks later. But this is the first time because
Speaker 2: the interconnection world, we are and almost like simultaneous with
Speaker 2: watching live like when the microblocks they sent out the
Speaker 2: messages about Neil Heywood might have been killed by the
Speaker 2: wife of the party chief, and immediately overseas we knew
Speaker 2: it simultaneously too, So that's how we were able to
Speaker 2: jump on the story right away. And then the overseas
Speaker 2: media played a huge role in spreading the news to
Speaker 2: when they deleted the block. But the overseas media picked
Speaker 2: up right away, like some of the Chinese language media
Speaker 2: out like that my co author he ran, and then
Speaker 2: some of the English media, that Times, the Financial Times,
Speaker 2: New York Times, War Street Journal, and they had a
Speaker 2: lot of reporters who are very well.
Speaker 4: Trained in Chinese language.
Speaker 2: And then they were so fast too, so this whole thing,
Speaker 2: it just played out simultaneously and were able to watch it.
Speaker 2: So that's the second milestone event, the defection of the
Speaker 2: police chief, and also triggered people's interests in the Nilhi death,
Speaker 2: and so this case resurfaced again.
Speaker 3: So let's go back to February of twenty twelve. So
Speaker 3: the police chief has asked for asylum. The US says no,
Speaker 3: They've turned it over to the Chinese government, not the
Speaker 3: political chiefs, the mayor's troops, but the Chinese government, and
Speaker 3: the police chief is brought in where Beijing or someplace
Speaker 3: for interrogation.
Speaker 2: Yes, the police chief was brought into Beijing for interrogation.
Speaker 2: They wanted to protect him because he held very important
Speaker 2: information about the party Chip toun Kin. So that's how
Speaker 2: this all started. And then once this whole thing happened,
Speaker 2: and even though China tried very much to control information,
Speaker 2: control the flow of information, and then you spread very
Speaker 2: very quickly. And then the Chinese media was forced to
Speaker 2: publicize it. They just say the police chief has escaped
Speaker 2: to the American counsulate. But then the Chinese government decided
Speaker 2: now to do anything because it was right before a
Speaker 2: very important conference in China in March, so they did
Speaker 2: not want to disturb peace. And then they want this
Speaker 2: conference to go on. And then party chief, they are
Speaker 2: very they all delegates to the the legislative conference in March,
Speaker 2: the Chinese legislature they meet once a year for a
Speaker 2: couple of weeks in Beijing.
Speaker 4: So they decided now to do it.
Speaker 2: But then the media, especially the international media, who were
Speaker 2: basing beating, They kept asking. They wanted to show what
Speaker 2: the police chief allowed with true they kept asking, but
Speaker 2: the Chinese media refused to our Chinese officials refused to
Speaker 2: answer the question. And also because twenty twelve I told
Speaker 2: you before, twenty twelve is a big year for China's
Speaker 2: succession plan. Every four years, the Chinese president is like
Speaker 2: they need to have a new croup. Leaders are taken
Speaker 2: over and in China it's supposed to be a collective leadership.
Speaker 2: So the top echelon of the organization is called the
Speaker 2: Pola Buier Standing Committee.
Speaker 4: This is a group of seven senior leaders.
Speaker 2: And then they formed the Standing Committee of the Communist Party,
Speaker 2: and then the president is the top and then controls
Speaker 2: this committee. So there was taught that the party chief
Speaker 2: might be a candidate for the Poler Buller Standing Committee.
Speaker 2: So people start to say, oh, is this police chief defection.
Speaker 2: It's going to affect his ascension, It's going to affect
Speaker 2: his political career. And then the Chinese government totally shout
Speaker 2: off the rumor, saying it's a rumor. And then this
Speaker 2: defection is a totally isolated incident and then nothing is
Speaker 2: going to happen. And then suddenly back in March and
Speaker 2: they made an announcement that they decide to remove the party
Speaker 2: chief from his post. And then in April they officially
Speaker 2: announced that he and his wife they were involved in
Speaker 2: the murder. They starts in the murder of British businessman
Speaker 2: Neil Heywood.
Speaker 3: Well, now this is intriguing because now I want to
Speaker 3: know what they say. The motive is, why would okay,
Speaker 3: and let's talk about their names. So do I call
Speaker 3: him Bow and how do I say her name?
Speaker 2: Ball is the name of the former party chief Tun
Speaker 2: King Bo. Yeah, and his wife's name is good g U.
Speaker 2: You asked the right exactly the right question. After Ball
Speaker 2: and they were under arrest and the party said they're
Speaker 2: going to do a serious investigation. People start to ask
Speaker 2: why do they want to kill Neil Heyward? Who is
Speaker 2: Neil Hayward? And what is the connection? What prompts the
Speaker 2: party chief's wife, this prominent family, she has everything she wanted.
Speaker 2: Why did she want to kill a British businessman? So
Speaker 2: this is the whole as the party. Even though the
Speaker 2: party controls the flow of information, and then a lot
Speaker 2: of people start to information start to leak out. The
Speaker 2: leakers of the information they have different motives too, because first,
Speaker 2: previously China is impossible because there's no transparison in the
Speaker 2: Chinese government, impossible to know what is happening.
Speaker 4: But then a lot of.
Speaker 2: People within the party who feel threatened by the party
Speaker 2: chiefs ascension.
Speaker 4: They were we call it their political opponents.
Speaker 2: They want to tarnish his reputation, they want to end
Speaker 2: his chances for being promoted, so they start to leak
Speaker 2: information about what was really happening. That's how my co
Speaker 2: author was in New York. He ran the Chinese media
Speaker 2: company and also publishing house. A lot of different sources
Speaker 2: start to call him and start to explain the question
Speaker 2: you just raised. Who was Neil Hayward and why did
Speaker 2: grule the party? Chip's wife want to kill him. During
Speaker 2: that the next six or seven month and we start
Speaker 2: to get this NonStop, like the feeding with the information,
Speaker 2: were able to sit together a picture of what happened.
Speaker 4: It turned out that Neil.
Speaker 2: Hayward he himself when he came to China to teach English,
Speaker 2: and when he was in Dallian. I told you that
Speaker 2: he ended in the city in the coastal city in
Speaker 2: northeastern part of China. At that time, Wall was the
Speaker 2: mayor of Dahlian and his wife lived in that city
Speaker 2: and they they were very prominent couples in the city
Speaker 2: because they were the children of the senior commings leaders.
Speaker 4: So nil he Would was also in the city.
Speaker 2: He heard about them, and then eventually when he heard
Speaker 2: that Ball and his wife, they send their son to
Speaker 2: study in Herold in the UK. It was the same
Speaker 2: school that Nil hey Would he attended his alma major.
Speaker 2: So he wrote a letter to the couple saying that
Speaker 2: I'm also a graduate from.
Speaker 4: There, I know UK very well.
Speaker 2: I'm willing to take care of your son if you
Speaker 2: needed help. So that's how he got connected with the
Speaker 2: Ball family. So when when their son went to study
Speaker 2: in the UK, the wife who Kaili, went to accompany
Speaker 2: her son.
Speaker 4: They stayed in London.
Speaker 2: Nil he would met them a couple of times, and
Speaker 2: then they became really good friends. So Nil he would
Speaker 2: told the wife, you can go back to China. I'll
Speaker 2: be here and be the guardian. And then so before
Speaker 2: he left, she offered him an old car, an expensive car,
Speaker 2: but they can drive a sound around during the weekend.
Speaker 2: And also when her son needed money, and then Neil
Speaker 2: Heywood was the middle person to wire money to the
Speaker 2: UK because you know it could be more risky if
Speaker 2: the official they wire money oversees it could be perceived
Speaker 2: as scandalous.
Speaker 3: So I have two questions. So first will be what
Speaker 3: was Neil Haywood's motivation to do any of this? Was
Speaker 3: he being paid? Why would he befriend them? Certainly not
Speaker 3: to just be helpful.
Speaker 2: In China, is they call connections once you have the
Speaker 2: political connections into this powerful family and then you can
Speaker 2: find more opportunities in the future. For example, he could
Speaker 2: tell the other Western businessman who want to do business
Speaker 2: in China and say, I have this powerful connection. I'm
Speaker 2: Groad friends with the Bull family, and then you know
Speaker 2: it's a political capital. He wanted to take vantage drops
Speaker 2: it gradually start to who got his way into the
Speaker 2: Boy family guard their trust.
Speaker 4: And then when he returned.
Speaker 2: To Dahlia, he started a business consulting firm and used
Speaker 2: the connections to get projects from the politicians there, and
Speaker 2: then he started to prosper and then their connection get
Speaker 2: closer and closer, and then Ball and his wife started
Speaker 2: to get Neil. He would involved in some of the
Speaker 2: major contracts. For example, major wealthy businessmen wanted to build
Speaker 2: a whole some luxury bush style town homes or resorts,
Speaker 2: and then they want Neil to be involved in this.
Speaker 2: Neil he would say, oh, I can bring some wealthy
Speaker 2: bush people here they can buy the luxury homes, or
Speaker 2: I can you know, make connections with Western investors they
Speaker 2: can invest.
Speaker 4: So it was a big, huge.
Speaker 2: Construction projects and then Neil was involved for several years,
Speaker 2: but they after a couple of years he never brought
Speaker 2: any wealthy British businessman who would want to go all
Speaker 2: the way to tun Jing to Southwestern trying to invest there.
Speaker 2: You know, I guess it was very tough tough sell.
Speaker 2: And also the other thing is during that time, boy,
Speaker 2: she like realized this construction project could be a liability
Speaker 2: because if people find out, they'll know that the party
Speaker 2: chief is giving up this lucrative contract to his friends
Speaker 2: and to his family members. So the party chief canceled
Speaker 2: the projects and Neil was initially promised twenty million dollars
Speaker 2: if the projects work, if the construction projects went through,
Speaker 2: but then it didn't go through. It fell through because
Speaker 2: the government canceled the projects. He didn't get a single penny.
Speaker 2: And then after he worked for these several years and
Speaker 2: then he got nothing, he got desperate. He had money problems,
Speaker 2: so he wanted to get money. He said, at least
Speaker 2: you should compensate me for the time I put in there.
Speaker 2: So he tried to pressure Gool but they didn't want
Speaker 2: to give him money. They felt like he didn't contribute anything. Also,
Speaker 2: this project was killed right there was the information saying
Speaker 2: that he went to travel to London and then he
Speaker 2: knew that he always wired money to the Sun. They
Speaker 2: overseas assets was controlled by the Sun. He went there
Speaker 2: to talk to the Sun, saying that you need to
Speaker 2: pay me the money.
Speaker 4: The Sun rejected, Oh.
Speaker 1: Wow, how much money were they sending this kid?
Speaker 2: We cannot verify the information. Some of they said twenty
Speaker 2: million dollars, thirty million dollars, you know it's that. But yes,
Speaker 2: you see a lot of the wealthy Chinese and the
Speaker 2: senior governor officials during the past two decades, they siffned
Speaker 2: a lot of money out to pick because for they
Speaker 2: felt like it was not stable in China. A lot
Speaker 2: of people they investled money and they want to transfer
Speaker 2: overseas through different means. And there was a lot of
Speaker 2: money flown to the West or to the neighboring countries.
Speaker 2: So this was just an example, and he would supposed
Speaker 2: to go out all the receipt he said.
Speaker 4: He started to threaten the kid, saying.
Speaker 2: If you don't pay the money out of all this
Speaker 2: event to show about how you guys try to smuggle
Speaker 2: money overseas. And then one day it was supposedly saying
Speaker 2: that he held Both's son against his will in the
Speaker 2: apartment for a couple of hours trying to get money
Speaker 2: out of him. So he called his mother and then
Speaker 2: told her about it.
Speaker 1: And that I'm sure did not she didn must not
Speaker 1: have reacted well.
Speaker 2: To that exactly. So the mother got desperate. She's worried.
Speaker 2: She said, oh my god, this Neil Heywood is going
Speaker 2: to try to kill my son. So she became so desperate.
Speaker 2: At that time, she became friends with the party chief
Speaker 2: and she consulted with party ship, say what are we
Speaker 2: going to do about this case? How do we do
Speaker 2: the threat? So the party chief said, there's a couple
Speaker 2: of ways we can do it. We can lure him
Speaker 2: out of Beijing to come to Chunking, and we can
Speaker 2: probably use a drug ring, saying that he's a drug
Speaker 2: ring leader of foreign foreigners selling drugs in in China
Speaker 2: were China had very tough drug laws. So we can
Speaker 2: do We can kill him in a shootout and then
Speaker 2: plan some drugs in there. But then they realized he
Speaker 2: would still a British businessman if we do this drug operations,
Speaker 2: if you cause an international incident, So they concouted the
Speaker 2: plots and maybe that's a good idea to get him
Speaker 2: into Chunking and then to poison him and they kill him.
Speaker 2: And also they felt like it's less risky for a
Speaker 2: couple of reasons. It's first except drinking, and then there
Speaker 2: was no evidence he could have died of a heart attack.
Speaker 2: The other thing is there was suspicion that Neil Haywood
Speaker 2: might have been worked for six and then also he
Speaker 2: sometimes played up the mystery and it was said that
Speaker 2: his license plate with double seven or something. So he
Speaker 2: was under the surveilance of the Chinese government as well.
Speaker 2: So the police chiefs rush now is that since he
Speaker 2: was a British spy, if we killed him quietly, right,
Speaker 2: the British probably won't make a big issue out of
Speaker 2: it because they didn't want they did not want to
Speaker 2: reveal his true identity. And also the Chinese government, the
Speaker 2: central government, they probably wanted there too because they suspect
Speaker 2: it could be a British spy. So they concoted this plan.
Speaker 2: But the wife or the police, sheef that she has
Speaker 2: to do it herself. So the plan was on February thirteenth,
Speaker 2: so Gool called Neil Heywood and invited him to toung
Speaker 2: Qing and bought him first class airline tickets. Invite him
Speaker 2: to tong Qin, saying I have some important business deal
Speaker 2: to discuss with you. She also sent her driver was
Speaker 2: a retired military man, sent her driver to pick up
Speaker 2: Neil Heywood in Beijing. So they came together to toung
Speaker 2: Qing and then they put him up in this hotel
Speaker 2: called the English version of the hotel called Lucky Holiday Hotel.
Speaker 2: This hotel is located on top of mountain, secluded area
Speaker 2: and they have different individuals British style the two story villas,
Speaker 2: and they put him up in a room called sixteen
Speaker 2: oh five. So I actually visited the hotel while researching
Speaker 2: for my book. It's very secluded and if something happened,
Speaker 2: nobody will know. It's because of the tree tree lined streets,
Speaker 2: and then each villa has some distance from it's kind
Speaker 2: of far away from the others. It's the perfect crime scene.
Speaker 2: So they they brought him over and they drove him
Speaker 2: on their way to see Neil Haywood, who bought a
Speaker 2: bottle of the expensive I think they call the Royal
Speaker 2: Salute whiskey. And then they brought the whiskey, and then
Speaker 2: they brought some of the muscle relaxant, and then some
Speaker 2: rat poisoning which contains cyanide. And then they also brought
Speaker 2: some herbal ecstasy, some of the crystal map. They brought
Speaker 2: this one they want to spread near the crime scene
Speaker 2: to show that as if he had the rock overdose
Speaker 2: or drink over drinking, according to the core papers. They
Speaker 2: got to the hotel, they started drinking, and then in
Speaker 2: China there is a very common practice and to force
Speaker 2: your guests to drink. Oh, drink this bottom up, that's common. Yeah,
Speaker 2: bottom up. It's supposed to be a good get of
Speaker 2: good will. It bottom up, and sometimes it's hard to
Speaker 2: turn it. Always tell people when you go there, they
Speaker 2: ask if you can't drink too much? Just said I
Speaker 2: don't drink. But they normally it's a friendly gesture. Oh
Speaker 2: come out, drink white, you'l drink whine. So soon, very quickly.
Speaker 2: Neil Hay would obviously had a low alcohol tolerance, so
Speaker 2: very quickly. He almost passed out once he went to
Speaker 2: the bathroom to vomit, and they immediately they put the
Speaker 2: mess in a Soi shale pad and then they fed
Speaker 2: him the medicine. Also because they mixed the muscle relaxing
Speaker 2: in the alcohol, he's probably by that time. It was
Speaker 2: pretty helpless at the time, they fed the red poison
Speaker 2: into a mouth, and then when he started to have
Speaker 2: different reactions, and then they tried to control him. And
Speaker 2: then once they thought he was he died or something,
Speaker 2: so they left and then pulled the Donati sturb side
Speaker 2: on and then they left the villa.
Speaker 4: So after she left.
Speaker 2: The villa, and then she called the police chief right away,
Speaker 2: she said, I just did it. And then the police
Speaker 2: chief said, don't worry about it, I'll take care of it.
Speaker 2: They waited till the hotel staff member found the bodies,
Speaker 2: so the police chief said, took police officers there. They
Speaker 2: took some blood samples quietly but without telling the family everything,
Speaker 2: and then they took two blood samples and then they
Speaker 2: had his body cruminated, so they made it as if
Speaker 2: he died of excessive drinking.
Speaker 3: So I know you can't get into the mind of
Speaker 3: Neil Heywood, but I don't understand why he would after
Speaker 3: threatening this couple's son, you know, trying to exhort my
Speaker 3: out of them or whatever, why would he think it
Speaker 3: was a good idea to accept an invitation from Goo.
Speaker 3: And I assume Bo signed off on all of this Also,
Speaker 3: I mean, he knew that they were very upset with him.
Speaker 3: Why did he think that this was going to be okay?
Speaker 2: I think that at first he knew Gool for a
Speaker 2: long time, the kind of friends. Also, if the wife
Speaker 2: of a party chief costs you to discuss a business meeting,
Speaker 2: you cannot decline. If this, you know, he knew that
Speaker 2: there was the only chance. He was probably still holding
Speaker 2: to the hope that if he couldn't get money from
Speaker 2: the other sources, right, maybe Goo was creating a new
Speaker 2: projects so to pay him back in a different way.
Speaker 2: I just think that he was desperate for money, even
Speaker 2: though his friends later said he was seemed to be okay.
Speaker 2: But I think in China, under those circumstances, the wife
Speaker 2: of very powerful men they called you to say, could
Speaker 2: you fly oward to Tung King too, we can discuss
Speaker 2: some business deals.
Speaker 4: There's no way he could turn it down.
Speaker 2: But he was suspicious because he would would have thought
Speaker 2: that the wife of this prominent politician in China would
Speaker 2: have wanted to kill him. So that's the rational, That's
Speaker 2: what we can only speculate on that. But regardless, he came,
Speaker 2: and he even drank with the woman, and also with the.
Speaker 4: Driver and then he was killed there.
Speaker 2: And then a few days later the police chief took
Speaker 2: care for it. Everything seemed to be okay, but Ghoul
Speaker 2: became a little paranoid.
Speaker 1: Well no kidding, I'm sure she was.
Speaker 4: Yeah, he got the paranoid.
Speaker 2: So he was worried that the police chief might have
Speaker 2: some other evidence, so he wanted the police chief to
Speaker 2: destroy the evidence. And then the police chief they brought
Speaker 2: some of the police officers and brought some of the documents,
Speaker 2: say we don't have copies here, I will destroy them
Speaker 2: in front of you. But he actually made copies, but
Speaker 2: he had them destroyed. At the same time, the police
Speaker 2: chip had his own mode hips. Two of the things
Speaker 2: that happened during that time. First, the police chief have
Speaker 2: been transferred to chan Ching from a different city. Some
Speaker 2: of his friends in that different city was under investigation.
Speaker 2: And because he when he was in chan Ching, he
Speaker 2: arrested a lot of people and put them in jail,
Speaker 2: he made a lot of political enemies, so they wanted
Speaker 2: to arrest his friends in another city. And then in retaliation,
Speaker 2: so the police chief was asking the party chief, his
Speaker 2: friend or Good's husband, Ball said, would you like to
Speaker 2: help me resolve it to intervene and then so to
Speaker 2: have my friends released. And Ball refused to do that
Speaker 2: because he's not going to stick his head out for
Speaker 2: some kind of his subordinates, right, and it was also
Speaker 2: his political risk. He was his year to be elevated
Speaker 2: to the highest governing body of China. Another thing is
Speaker 2: he also wanted the party chief of changing to give
Speaker 2: him a promote. He was loving for promotion, so he
Speaker 2: thought now that he did a favor to the wife
Speaker 2: of the party ship, he wanted payback, so he wanted
Speaker 2: Good to lobby her husband to give him a promotional
Speaker 2: to help him out, and then Goul did, but what
Speaker 2: she turned her down, So the tensions started to build
Speaker 2: right and also so the wife felt like he was
Speaker 2: not able to help.
Speaker 4: The police sheep.
Speaker 2: He knew the police chip would try to retaliate, so
Speaker 2: she became so paranoid she decided one day when the
Speaker 2: police chief was in Beaging attending a conference, so she
Speaker 2: went to his house, raiding his house trying to look
Speaker 2: for evidence see if the police cheop was holding any
Speaker 2: evidence against her, and then she intergated a lot of
Speaker 2: people around him. So the police sheep felt like this
Speaker 2: was getting out of control. So he decided to have
Speaker 2: a conversation with.
Speaker 4: Ball with the party chief.
Speaker 2: He arranged the meeting with the party chief and then
Speaker 2: first he asked the party chief to offer him a
Speaker 2: promotion to help him, and the party ship turned it down.
Speaker 2: And then he started to say, I just want you
Speaker 2: to know that your wife is involved in a very
Speaker 2: serious murder case of British business, Neil Haywood. And then
Speaker 2: the party chief was very shocked, right he said come
Speaker 2: back to me. I'll talk to you later, and then
Speaker 2: he started doing a lot of investigations. He rounded up
Speaker 2: the people who work for the plice chief try to
Speaker 2: find out what was happening. And then we learned that
Speaker 2: the police chief was secretly collecting a lot of negative
Speaker 2: information about him, and he felt betrayed.
Speaker 4: So the next.
Speaker 2: Day when he came over, when the police chief came
Speaker 2: over for a second meeting to discuss the murder of
Speaker 2: good Kaili, and then the police chief brought this up
Speaker 2: again and Ball became so angry that the police chip
Speaker 2: hid this whole information from him.
Speaker 4: He slapped the police chief across the face.
Speaker 2: Was such a severe slap that only during setting court
Speaker 2: that he had a lot on the corner of his mouth,
Speaker 2: his ears have some food in the ears.
Speaker 4: Was very severe.
Speaker 2: And also in China, slapping somebody across his face is
Speaker 2: considered a huge humilating blow.
Speaker 4: This is to him.
Speaker 2: He felt like he was so loyal to the party
Speaker 2: chief for the past six seven years. He helped him
Speaker 2: get rid of a lot of the political opponents. He
Speaker 2: made so many enemies. You know, he felt wrong. He
Speaker 2: was so mad. He just left. He decided to retaliate.
Speaker 2: And also after the slap, the police chief announced the
Speaker 2: resignation of him, just forced him out.
Speaker 3: This is how the police chief eventually ends up at
Speaker 3: the American consulate exactly.
Speaker 2: And then the police chief realized that if he didn't
Speaker 2: do anything, he could be killed and then could be murdered.
Speaker 2: They could push him off from the high rise saying that.
Speaker 1: He had mental illness.
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2: And then he reached out to people in Beijing two
Speaker 2: before he went to the American embassy. So he reached
Speaker 2: out to his friends in Beijing. But everybody said that
Speaker 2: Bull is such a powerful political figure and he was
Speaker 2: ready to be elevated. They didn't show much sympathy. But
Speaker 2: the only thing they were kind of helpless in a while,
Speaker 2: so he felt the only way to save his life
Speaker 2: is to run to the American embassy to make the
Speaker 2: international scandal and in this way a lot of publicity
Speaker 2: might help and then he might have saved his life,
Speaker 2: which in the end he did save his life.
Speaker 3: Well, what ultimately happened, So he is shipped over to
Speaker 3: Beijing and interrogated. What happens to convince the authorities to
Speaker 3: then turn on one of their own, this person, you
Speaker 3: know Bo, who's supposed to send to you know, this
Speaker 3: seven member council right under the president. Do you then
Speaker 3: say we're going to put his wife on trial for murder?
Speaker 3: What changes just based on what this police chief has
Speaker 3: to say.
Speaker 2: So the police chief is very smart. He knew that
Speaker 2: the murder case alone wouldn't be able to bring down Ball,
Speaker 2: the person that he felt like he was threatening to
Speaker 2: kill him, because there was just his evidence saying Nku
Speaker 2: Kaila murdered somebody. So during the interrogation, now only he
Speaker 2: told authorities about how Neil he would was murdered, he
Speaker 2: also provided a lot of evidence to show that Ball
Speaker 2: was planning to stay your coup with the top leaders.
Speaker 2: Some of the leaders in Beijing trying to jeopardize undermine
Speaker 2: the succession process.
Speaker 1: And he had evidence, well that was real evidence that
Speaker 1: he had.
Speaker 2: He said he collected evidence. And also Ball happened to
Speaker 2: fall into the trap. Is Bough personally since he was
Speaker 2: the son of this prominent Commings leader. Right his personality,
Speaker 2: he's very even when he was the mayor of a
Speaker 2: small city, became the Commerce Minister of China, and when
Speaker 2: the party ship chu Qing, he is the person who
Speaker 2: is very high profile figure.
Speaker 4: He's very loud and flamboyant in a way.
Speaker 2: Will say each time he went somewhere, he had made
Speaker 2: a lot of noises, he made a lot of enemies.
Speaker 4: Like when he was in chu Qing.
Speaker 2: The first thing he did he got rid of the
Speaker 2: police chief and have him executed. And he launched this
Speaker 2: program completely reminiscent of China in the nineteen sixties and
Speaker 2: the cultural revolution. Like everybody started seeing the old revolutionary sounds,
Speaker 2: like when we were growing up in China in the
Speaker 2: nineteen sixties, it's like the Christian sounds. It's like the
Speaker 2: every day we have seen the sounds to praise Chama Maud,
Speaker 2: praise communists and that whole thing has long been repudiated.
Speaker 2: We found was you know, And he started the whole thing.
Speaker 2: He said, China after thirty years of capitalist reforms which
Speaker 2: haven't gone anywhere, and the gap the rich and poor
Speaker 2: is such it could jeopardize the rule of the Commist party.
Speaker 4: We need to go back to the rule. So he
Speaker 4: called him campaign and singing.
Speaker 2: Red sounds and strike against organized crimes.
Speaker 4: So he did a lot of this, and then he.
Speaker 2: Persecuted a lot of his political opponents, who made a
Speaker 2: lot of enemies. And then a lot of the people
Speaker 2: in Beijing they felt threatened by him. So when one
Speaker 2: started to say that he not only he did not
Speaker 2: want to be the party chief, he did not want
Speaker 2: to be elevated to the pol bearer member.
Speaker 4: He wanted to be the number one in China.
Speaker 2: And then he wanted to be He and some other
Speaker 2: senior members of the Polybuer member the governing body's member.
Speaker 2: They want to build their lines overthrow the rule of
Speaker 2: the conference that covered the presidence. So he used cakes
Speaker 2: and said sometimes she would made disparent and remarks about
Speaker 2: the senior leaders.
Speaker 1: But was this true? Was any is this true that
Speaker 1: he was saying.
Speaker 2: Dumba is a true but I think the more they exaggerated,
Speaker 2: and a lot of his political components, they couldn't wait
Speaker 2: to use these two, whether it's you undermine him and
Speaker 2: get rid of him.
Speaker 3: So I feel all different kinds of things about Boa
Speaker 3: and Goole. So I felt badly for them because it
Speaker 3: sounded like Heywood was really intimidating their son and trying
Speaker 3: to extort money, and then didn't feel badly for them
Speaker 3: because they're sending money overseas when they shouldn't be. And
Speaker 3: then you're saying that he's executed a former police chief
Speaker 3: and this current police chief is scared for his life,
Speaker 3: but it also sounds like he's being that Boa is
Speaker 3: being persecuted for something he didn't really do, even though
Speaker 3: it does sound like he probably would like to do it.
Speaker 1: So I just I don't know where all this is going.
Speaker 2: This is a political game that you're succession, right, Everyone
Speaker 2: want to get ahead. But the party, the Central Party
Speaker 2: Committee has also had already had a plan the Chijing
Speaker 2: Ping as the successor to the present position. And now
Speaker 2: you have somebody here who comes try to disrupt the
Speaker 2: status ball and they're not going to let it happen.
Speaker 2: And then they want to get rid of him. And
Speaker 2: then also some of his policies during that time, people
Speaker 2: felt threatened because they felt like he was reversing China's
Speaker 2: policy thirty years of trying to finally get into the
Speaker 2: close to the west and get opened up, and you
Speaker 2: go into the mild era, you start to do this.
Speaker 4: So a multiple factors and.
Speaker 2: Then really his political opponents said, now we finally got evidence.
Speaker 2: They use this murder case and successfully they got rid
Speaker 2: of him. So after Wali Jin had this his own reportings,
Speaker 2: and then the funny thing is when right after committed murder,
Speaker 2: he called the police chief to told him about it.
Speaker 2: The police chief knew that he could use this later,
Speaker 2: so he taped the whole conversation wow of a Goo
Speaker 2: Kaila admitting that she killed Neil Haywood to protect her
Speaker 2: soon and so he tape everything. He also had the
Speaker 2: blood samples to show that Neil Haywood died of sini
Speaker 2: not rather than except drinking. So he had all this
Speaker 2: thing preserved and he turned it over to the Central
Speaker 2: Party Committee and then they used this and the final
Speaker 2: they decided to hold a public trial.
Speaker 3: At first I thought the police chief is paranoid, but
Speaker 3: I guess now that I know that his predecessor had
Speaker 3: been executed by Bella, then I understand why he had
Speaker 3: collected all of this stuff. What ultimately happens. So Google's
Speaker 3: on trial for murdering Haywood, right.
Speaker 2: Yes, and then and the public pressure, international pressure, they
Speaker 2: decided to put him on the show trial Like the
Speaker 2: whole trial happened much anticipated, I think in August twenty thirteen,
Speaker 2: a year after. And then the whole trial lasted seven hours.
Speaker 2: They claimed that they have interviewed more than three hundred
Speaker 2: witnesses and then the officers stuff like that, but they
Speaker 2: never did any cross examination. And then they just presented
Speaker 2: some of the evidence. A lot of the evidence. They
Speaker 2: mentioned that the police she provided and something they never like.
Speaker 2: They never played the tape and they just had goog KaiA.
Speaker 2: She went out there. You could tell that we were watched.
Speaker 2: It was little all because she used to be this
Speaker 2: stunning woman. She used to be called the kinda on
Speaker 2: aessense of China.
Speaker 4: But she was there.
Speaker 2: But she said very contraved in a very contrived tale,
Speaker 2: saying that sounded very repentant, saying that I killed Niol
Speaker 2: hay Would because he threatened my son and that I
Speaker 2: did something terribly wrong. And you know, she confessed the murder.
Speaker 2: After the trial a few days later, she was sentenced
Speaker 2: to death penalty, but waiting more two year years and
Speaker 2: they try they extend that to life imprisonments.
Speaker 4: So that's okay.
Speaker 2: So I think the trial is so come down in
Speaker 2: such a hasty manner, so so many unsolved questions, And
Speaker 2: then after she died, people still didn't believe that she
Speaker 2: really killed Neil Hayward. First she was supposed to be
Speaker 2: They said that she was diagnosed with the severe mental
Speaker 2: health issues. She had schizophrenia, and she had severe bipolar symptoms. Right,
Speaker 2: and then if she and she was heavy medicated, and said,
Speaker 2: how would you how could you trust her own words
Speaker 2: without letting other witnesses interview other witnesses or you know
Speaker 2: that they didn't even play the tape. And then there
Speaker 2: was also the thing is that she consulted with the
Speaker 2: police chief before Nil Haywood was invited to chun Ching
Speaker 2: after he arrived in toun Jing. And then the police
Speaker 2: she was supposed to monitor everything because he helped her obstrate.
Speaker 4: Their home murder kids.
Speaker 2: Right, she was a lawyer, and then all the police
Speaker 2: chief was helping her, right, why didn't she take some
Speaker 2: basic precaution. For example, when she was trying to administer
Speaker 2: the rad poison, she didn't even wear gloves, and then
Speaker 2: she had her fingerprints all over the stuff. And also
Speaker 2: some people say that there were some other people's footprints
Speaker 2: in the room they found out, but they never explored
Speaker 2: this evidence. And also more importantly, they did not believe
Speaker 2: that she was capable of murdering Neil Haywood. And because
Speaker 2: the rat poisoning itself in China, red Points considered a
Speaker 2: very tiny amount of sinid, not enough to kill the person.
Speaker 2: The police chief said that he took two blood samples
Speaker 2: before he was cremated. One blood sample had no trace
Speaker 2: of sinid in it at all, but the second blood
Speaker 2: sample that while was worried that could be teraminated. He
Speaker 2: gave the blood sample to a friend and then the
Speaker 2: friend transported to another city to captain refrigerator. And then
Speaker 2: when this whole case came out, one you said, I
Speaker 2: was so worried that Ball and the GUKAILI they would
Speaker 2: find out, they would damage the evidence.
Speaker 4: So I transferred the aviding to another city.
Speaker 2: But then the second evidence of the blood voles whatever
Speaker 2: they took and then contain sinide just the right amount
Speaker 2: to kill somebody that said, how could you be so
Speaker 2: accurate to put the right amount there? So there's all
Speaker 2: these different un answered the questions. So in my book
Speaker 2: that we argue that Gu Kaili herself was not capable enough.
Speaker 4: To commit the murder alone.
Speaker 2: We strongly believe that the police chief has a strong
Speaker 2: motive to help perpetrate the murder because once he had
Speaker 2: enough evidence against Gu Caili, he could use as a
Speaker 2: leverage to lobby for promotion with Ball because he felt
Speaker 2: he was he had a trump card, is your wife
Speaker 2: killed a British businessman and then you'd better give me
Speaker 2: a promotion otherwise have to publicize.
Speaker 1: That everybody is horrible in this story.
Speaker 2: Nobody's innocent, So everybody has their own different motives. It's
Speaker 2: just a corruption within China, is you know, the money
Speaker 2: and power, and then this whole thing so entwined in
Speaker 2: the story, and then you know, the police chief ended
Speaker 2: up because he himself tried so hard to use different
Speaker 2: ways to bring down the Chunjian party chief to save
Speaker 2: his own life. And then the party chiefs political opponents
Speaker 2: in Beijing they've used the perfect excus to bring him down.
Speaker 2: And then Onely Jean, through his collaboration with Boss political opponents,
Speaker 2: he was able to save his life. And then he
Speaker 2: was put on trial as well. Due to his collaboration.
Speaker 2: He was only sentenced to fifteen years in prison.
Speaker 3: This is the police chief, right, the police chief, Okay,
Speaker 3: so tell me what happens with everybody. So the police
Speaker 3: chief gets fifteen years in prison as like an accessory
Speaker 3: or whatever.
Speaker 4: Right, right.
Speaker 2: And then Ball was locked behind bars right before the succession.
Speaker 2: The succession normally happened in October, and then they extended
Speaker 2: for one month in November. And then at the party
Speaker 2: in congress when the new leadership was going to take over,
Speaker 2: everything went according to plan because Ball was safely locked
Speaker 2: behind bars. And then after the succession was done, and
Speaker 2: then they start the purchase.
Speaker 4: So Ball was the first one to go.
Speaker 2: He was sentenced to lifeline imprisonment for embezzlement public fund investment.
Speaker 2: And then the second part is all the people who
Speaker 2: were in Beijing, there were some seiate leaders. They were
Speaker 2: all gradually they were purged and they were sentenced to
Speaker 2: lifelong imprisonment or different kind of punishment in the name
Speaker 2: of corruption in this way to guarantee that the coup
Speaker 2: did not happen. And then they also call it a
Speaker 2: political cup because you bore was trying to his biggest
Speaker 2: crime is to try to stay a coup against the
Speaker 2: current leadership. That was the main reason. And then highlight
Speaker 2: one of the reasons we felt like she was so
Speaker 2: willingly a magical crime. We felt like she must have
Speaker 2: struck a deal with the Chinese government.
Speaker 4: Two things.
Speaker 2: First they let go of her son, who studied in
Speaker 2: New York and then later moved to Canada. Bo Blah
Speaker 2: blah was the name of the sun. And then right
Speaker 2: now they said, if you plead guilty, we will spur
Speaker 2: her sign of because if in a strict legal sense,
Speaker 2: her son was also involved in the corruption scandal, right
Speaker 2: you transfer the money out and he was the receiving end.
Speaker 2: And then they never pursue an hrgist against her son.
Speaker 2: And then said down one thing.
Speaker 4: I think.
Speaker 2: The other thing is she porportrayed the murder alone. She
Speaker 2: thought she could could have saved her husband, but that
Speaker 2: was not the case. But then she's still languishing in jail.
Speaker 2: And then during the trial of her husband, he added
Speaker 2: a New Triss. He kept saying that the police sheep
Speaker 2: and his wife had an affair and they were supporting
Speaker 2: each other. That's why she conducted the murder. And then
Speaker 2: everything was done without his knowledge and all that, but
Speaker 2: you know, it didn't help. And then the main reason
Speaker 2: his biggest crime was the political as the political call,
Speaker 2: rather than the murder.
Speaker 4: So he was jailed.
Speaker 2: And then recently there was a rumor saying that he
Speaker 2: was diagnosed with liver cancer. He was a medical parole.
Speaker 2: Somebody said he died, but nobody can verify the information,
Speaker 2: just pure rumor right now. But one thing is for sure,
Speaker 2: he's still locked behind bars. And when we were doing
Speaker 2: the story, we interviewed that China insider before his verdict
Speaker 2: was announced. We were asking said, how many years do
Speaker 2: you think he will get? The guy said, I don't
Speaker 2: know how many years would get, but one thing for sure,
Speaker 2: they would never let him get out alive and become
Speaker 2: a threat to the current leadership. So they achieved their goal.
Speaker 1: What about gool you said she died, Did she die
Speaker 1: in prison?
Speaker 2: No, that there was the boar is nobody knows. She's
Speaker 2: still in jail as far as we know. And also
Speaker 2: receiving psychiatric help. I know that her son right now is.
Speaker 4: Practicing law somewhere in Canada.
Speaker 2: My coaptor met with him before he left for Canada
Speaker 2: in New York City, and I think that in our
Speaker 2: book we mentioned that he's probably the last hope, is
Speaker 2: the descending this Bole family, this political dynasty, and this
Speaker 2: soll ended with the murder of Neil Haywood.
Speaker 3: If you love historical true crime stories, check out the
Speaker 3: audio versions of my books The Ghost Club, All That
Speaker 3: Is Wicked, and American Sherlock and Don't Forget. There are
Speaker 3: twelve seasons of my historical true crime podcast, Tenfold More
Speaker 3: Wicked right here in this podcast feed, scroll back and
Speaker 3: give them a listen if you haven't already. This has
Speaker 3: been an exactly right production. Our senior producer is Alexis
Speaker 3: a Morosi. Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain. This episode
Speaker 3: was mixed by John Bradley. Curtis Heath is our composer,
Speaker 3: artwork by Nick Toga. Executive produced by Georgia Hardstark, Karen
Speaker 3: Kilgarriff and Danielle Kramer. Follow Wicked Words on Instagram at
Speaker 3: tenfold More Wicked and on Facebook at Wicked Words Pod