SAN FRANCISCO (July 2, 2008) – The Dui Hua Foundation welcomes the parole of Jude Shao (邵裘德), an American businessman who has been serving a 16-year sentence for fraud and tax evasion in Qingpu Prison in Shanghai. Shao, a US citizen, was arrested in April 1998 and subsequently sentenced in March 2000 by the Shanghai Number One Intermediate People’s Court, the same court that granted his parole. He is residing with his family in Shanghai after leaving Qingpu Prison on July 2. His sentence is set to expire in May 2013.

The court recognized that Shao had fulfilled the conditions of parole under Chinese law. Shao has already served ten years in prison—more than half of his sentence—and he had already been granted a sentence reduction for good behavior. His willingness to reside in Shanghai, the city of his birth, was an important factor in the court’s decision to grant parole.

“Jude Shao’s release reflects the hard work over many years of his Stanford Business School classmates (www.freejudeshao.com) and the US government, in particular President Bush, who repeatedly raised his case with President Hu Jintao, and American diplomats, who visited Jude more than 100 times during his incarceration. His parole comes the day after Secretary Condoleezza Rice’s visit to Beijing and six weeks after the resumption of the US-China dialogue on human rights,” noted John Kamm, Dui Hua’s founder and executive director. “Shao’s case has drawn the attention of dozens of members of Congress, led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi in whose district Jude Shao based his business. I am proud that our foundation has assisted the effort to win Jude Shao’s release, and hope that it is a sign of greater cooperation between the two countries in the area of human rights and rule of law.”

 

The Dui Hua Foundation
San Francisco, California
July 2, 2008

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