Will Chinese politician’s wife’s ‘lookalike’ serve jail term for Heywood’s murder?

Aug 21, 2012 |

Beijing

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Experts have said that Gu Kailai, wife of disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai, employed a ‘lookalike’ to take her place in court during her trial for the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood.

Two security experts ‘familiar with facial recognition software’ said that the person shown in state television footage of the courtroom was not Kailai.

According to the Daily Mail, Gu looked plumper than before, in contrast to most Chinese prisoners who lost weight in jail, and experts claimed that the woman who appeared for the sentencing could not be the real accused.

If true, the real Kailai, 53, could have entered into a deal with Communist Party chiefs and be spending her time under house arrest, the report added.

According to the report, pictures have shown Kailai wearing a white shirt and black suit in the dock, where she stood calmly and praised the guilty verdict against her.

“I feel the verdict is just and fully reflects the court’s special respect for the law, its special respect for reality and, in particular, its special respect for life,” Kailai said.

According to the report, she apologized for the ‘great losses to the [Communist] Party and the country, for which I ought to shoulder the responsibility’ and described the case as a ‘huge stone weighing on me for more than half a year’.

The court also found Gu’s actions reflected a ‘psychological impairment,’ but did not elaborate, the report concluded.

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