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MI6 informant Wang Yam found guilty of killing millionaire author to steal
his identity
David Brown and Frances Gibb
A leading Chinese dissident who worked as an MI6 informant was convicted
yesterday of murdering a millionaire author to steal his identity.
Wang Yam battered Allan Chappelow, 86, to death at his villa in Hampstead,
North London, before trying to plunder his bank accounts. Yam, 47, insisted
throughout the police investigation and two trials that he had been framed
by 「men with no allegiance to this country」.
Most of the evidence was heard in secret after MI6 requested that the press
and public be excluded for almost all of the case.
Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, agreed to a Public Interest Immunity
certificate, making it the first murder trial covered by a secrecy order on
the ground of national security.
Before the order was granted it was reported that Yam was a 「low-level
informant」 for the intelligence services and that 「part of his defence
rested on his activities in that role」.
As Yam sat quietly in the dock at the Old Bailey, it was hard to imagine the
frail man with greying hair torturing a pensioner to death. But, the court
was told, he had become desperate for money.
Yam is from an influential Chinese family with strong links to the
leadership of the Communist Party. His grandfather was Ren Bi-Shi, a comrade
of Chairman Mao.
After gaining a master』s degree in theoretical physics Yam became an
associate professor at a university in Beijing. He became disillusioned with
communism and from the late 1980s was involved in the democracy movement
and the protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989. Yam fled to Hong Kong in 1992
after being pressed by Chinese government agents to betray his friends and
teachers involved in the demonstrations.
When he arrived in Britain he was granted asylum and continued his
involvement with the democracy campaign. At the same time he spent years
tricking members of the Chinese community in Britain out of money with fake
mortgage and insurance deals. He used numerous aliases to register internet
domain addresses, some of which were used to carry out frauds.
He projected an image of success, wearing Armani suits and Rolex watches,
and convinced fellow immigrants to lend him money to invest in the property
market during a string of mortgage scams. Yam admitted that he had taught
foreign criminals how to apply fraudulently for credit cards on the internet
for use in money-laundering schemes. Although police issued him with a
caution over his activities in 2002, in many cases the victims either
returned home or were unwilling to go to court.
In early 2006 he was made bankrupt with debts of £1.1 million connected
to a failed wine importing business in China. Even so, he made offers for
three Hampstead homes with bids of between £1.4 million and £1.6
million while posing as a director of various investment banks or as a City
lawyer. To support his bids he produced a false bank statement showing a
balance of 84 million Swiss francs (then equivalent to £39 million).
Before he could complete the scam he was served with an eviction notice from
the flat where he lived with his pregnant girlfriend, two roads from Mr
Chappelow』s £4 million home.
When Mr Chappelow took a rare holiday to visit relatives in America, Yam
stole his mail and discovered that the author had up to £50,000 in a
bank account and a large number of shares.
Mr Chappelow had spent the final 15 years of his life as a virtual recluse,
telling acquaintances that he was working on a secret book project at his
increasingly dilapidated home. The Cambridge graduate and Fellow of the
Royal Society of Arts was an expert on George Bernard Shaw and published two
prize-winning biographies of the author.
Police believe that Mr Chappelow was killed shortly after returning from
holiday and his body was hidden for five weeks under half a ton of book
proofs and other paperwork. While the body remained undiscovered Yam
manipulated the author』s bank accounts by stealing his mail and
impersonating him over the internet and telephone to obtain bank security
codes. However, he had little success because his accent did not fool bank
staff when he telephoned pretending to be the 「English gentleman」 writer.
When Mr Chappelow』s badly decomposed body was discovered, Yam fled Britain
on the Eurostar. He was extradited later from Switzerland.
Yam admitted using the writer』s credit cards but claimed that he had been
given them by the leader of a gang of criminals involved in human
trafficking and money laundering. His defence also claimed that there were
many possible suspects for the murder, including Mossad agents, the Chinese
triads, a young man that Mr Chappelow had befriended on Hampstead Heath or
his gardener』s young Brazilian assistant.
Most details of Yam』s defence, however, will never be made public. At his
first trial last April a jury failed to reach a verdict on the murder charge
but found him guilty of dishonestly obtaining two bank transfers for £
20,000 and handling four stolen cheques. He will be sentenced on Monday.
------------www.timesonline.co.uk Jan.17,2009 |
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