郭美美因开设赌场罪获刑五年

Guo Meimei, Chinese Internet Celebrity, Sentenced to Jail for Running Illicit Casino
郭美美因“开设赌场罪”获刑五年

Guo Meimei, a young woman who gained notoriety in China for flaunting a lavish lifestyle while claiming to work for the Red Cross, was convicted on Thursday of running a casino and sentenced to five years in prison and a fine of 50,000 renminbi, or about $7,830.

炫耀奢侈生活方式、还自称在中国红十字会工作的年轻女子郭美美在中国早已名声狼藉，周四她被判犯有开设赌场罪，并被判处有期徒刑5年、罚款人民币5万元（约7830美元）。

Gambling is illegal on the Chinese mainland, though it is the mainstay of the economy of the Chinese territory of Macau, the former Portuguese colony where Ms. Guo said in a televised confession after her arrest last year that she loved to gamble.

虽然赌博在中国大陆非法，但在现属于中国的前葡萄牙殖民地澳门，赌博是一个主要的经济支柱，郭美美去年被逮捕后，曾在一次电视播放的坦白中称，她喜欢去澳门赌博。

Ms. Guo, 24, pleaded not guilty at her short trial, which opened at Dongcheng District People’s Court in Beijing around 9 a.m. on Thursday and ended shortly after 4 p.m., according to the court’s blog. “I know I’ve made mistakes,” she told the court. “I should not have participated in gambling. But I don’t think my actions constituted the crime of running a casino.”The Dongcheng District People’s Court also sentenced Zhao Xiaolai, who it said was an accomplice to Ms. Guo’s crimes, to two years in prison and a fine of 20,000 renminbi.

现年24岁的郭美美在为时不长的庭审上不承认有罪。据法院微博帐户上发布的信息，审判于周四上午9点左右，在北京市东城区人民法院开始，下午4点过后不久就结束了。“我知道自己犯错了，”她在法庭上说。 “不应该参与赌博，可是我认为自己的行为不构成开设赌场罪。”东城区人民法院还判处其称之为郭美美同案犯的赵晓来2年有期徒刑，罚款人民币2万元。

Ms. Guo infuriated many Chinese for her conspicuous displays of wealth in online posts, which began in 2011, while she purported to be the commercial general manager of the Red Cross Society of China, the country’s official partner to the International Federation of Red Cross Societies.

郭美美于2011年起开始在网上炫富，激怒了许多中国人，她自称是红十字国际联合会中国官方合作伙伴、中国红十字会的商业总经理。

Although she later retracted that claim, the organization’s public reputation was damaged.

虽然她后来收回了这个说法，但中国红会的公众声誉受到损害。

And the state appeared to want to punish Ms. Guo. In her televised confession in August 2014, salacious details of her private life were aired, including that she and a “foreign boyfriend,” identified only as Mr. Kang, became lovers within “four or five days of meeting.”At the closely watched court hearing, Ms. Guo appeared quite different from the persona she had once presented in public, photographed lying on her white Maserati (her second expensive car; an orange Lamborghini was in another city, she said) or with a closet full of Hermès handbags.

国家看来想要惩罚郭美美。电视台在播放她2014年8月的供述时，披露了许多她私生活的淫秽细节，包括她和“一个外籍男友认识了四、五天后，就成为恋人”，电视台没有给出该男子更多的身份信息，只说他姓康。在受到密切关注的法院审理中，郭美美的样子看上去与她曾经呈现给公众的完全不同，她曾在网上发布照片，其中一张显示她倚在自己的白色玛莎拉蒂上，（她说，她在另一座城市里还拥有一辆昂贵的汽车，那是一辆橙色的兰博基尼），还有一张显示她的衣柜里装满了爱马仕手袋的照片。

Gone were the big sunglasses, the makeup, the skimpy dresses and swimwear. Instead, Ms. Guo wore a loose white shirt, pulled-back hair, large eyeglasses and a scrubbed face. She stood, appearing tiny between two tall court police officers.

她不再是那个带着大墨镜、上着浓妆、穿着裸露的连衣裙或泳装的样子。法庭上的郭美美穿了一件宽松的白衬衫，头发向后梳，带着大眼镜，没化一点妆。她站在那里，在两个高大的执法人员之间，显得很矮小。

Photographs in the Chinese news media appeared to show her arriving at the court in handcuffs, and, at one point, wearing what were described as lightweight leg shackles.

从中国新闻媒体上的照片来看，她被带到法院时似乎带着手铐，一度还带着类似轻脚镣的东西。

According to multiple news reports and court documents, Ms. Guo confessed to organizing Texas Hold’ Em poker games in her home on several occasions from 2011 to 2014, for groups of about half a dozen private guests.

据多家新闻报道和法庭文件，郭美美供认，曾在2011至2014年间，在自己家中，为大约五、六名私客组织过德州扑克扑克游戏。

Ms. Guo said in the televised confession that she had also organized some betting around the 2014 soccer World Cup.

根据电视播出的郭美美的供述，她还围绕2014年的足球世界杯赛组织了赌博。

But in court, she pushed back. She had not organized a casino, she said, she had merely held gambling parties at her home in an upscale apartment in eastern Beijing.

但她在法庭上翻了供。她说，她没有开设过赌场，她只不过是在自己位于北京东部的一所高档公寓里办过赌博派对而已。

Many Chinese still resent even loathe Ms. Guo, seeing her as a symbol of the selfishness and excess. They celebrated her downfall, often with insulting language.

许多中国人仍对郭美美反感、甚至厌恶，把她看作是自私和过度奢侈的象征。他们常用侮辱性的语言庆祝她的身败名裂。