Businesswoman Sentenced; Founder of Chinese Conglomerate Gets One-Month Prison Term in Tax Case
WASHINGTON--Loretta Fredy Bush, once an American success story in China, was sentenced Monday to one month in prison for a U.S. tax violation after her lawyer cited health problems in pleading for lenience.</br></br>Ms. Bush, a founder and former chief executive of Chinese financial-information conglomerate Xinhua Finance, had sought to avoid prison time and appeared visibly upset when leaving the courtroom.</br></br>Two associates were each sentenced Monday to nine months in prison. Prosecutors had been seeking sentences of between six and 12 months for each of the defendants. All three were fined $20,000 each.</br></br>"This kind of behavior is not who I am," Ms. Bush told U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth.</br></br>Judge Lamberth suggested that letting Ms. Bush and the others go without prison sentences would send the wrong public message about the consequences of violating U.S. tax laws. "It's a serious problem," he said. Court submissions from Ms. Bush's defense team portray a woman who has largely withdrawn from the business world since mid-2010. At that time, Ms. Bush had a grandson born with "daunting medical problems" and she provides daily care for the child, lawyers said. They said Ms. Bush, who now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, also had encountered serious vision problems that impaired her ability to read and travel.