June 30 (UPI) — A U.S. federal judge has sentenced exiled Chinese entrepreneur Guo Wengui to 30 years in prison for defrauding investors of more than $1 billion.

Guo, also known as Ho Wan Kwok and Miles Guo, is a Chinese national who made his fortune in Chinese real estate before fleeing China, in 2014, relocating to the United States around 2015.

He was arrested in March 2023 on a series of fraud and money laundrying charges. Federal prosecutors alleged that, beginning around 2018, he led a conspiracy that defrauded his online followers of more than $1 billion through investment and membership schemes tied to his anti-Chinese Communist Party movement and related business ventures.

In sentencing him on Monday to the three-decade punishment that the prosecutors had requested, Judge Analisa Torres in a Manhattan courtroom said Guo had “preyed on people seeking to bring democracy to China,” The New York Times reported.

During the trial, the prosecutors alleged that in around 2018, he created two nonprofit organizations, which he used to amass followers aligned against the CCP and who were inclined to believe his business advice.

In the years that followed, Guo established several investment opportunities that he advertised to his online followers, who gave him hundreds of millions of dollars over the years.

Prosecutors alleged that Guo had used the money he stole from his followers to line his own pockets, buying himself and cloase relatives luxuries, such as a 50,000-square-foot mansion, a $4.5 million Ferrari sports car and two $36,000 mattresses. He also used the money to finance a $37 million luxury yacht, they said.

Guo denied the accusations.

During sentencing Monday, Torres also imposed ann $889 million forfeiture order against Guo, chastising his “exploitation of a philanthropic purpose, his history of intimidation of critics and his refusal to accept responsibility,” The Guardian reported.

Yanping “Yvette” Wang, Guo’s former chief of staff, was sentenced to 10 years in January 2025 after pleading guilty to related wire fraud and money laundering charges. A second co-defendant, Kinn Ming Je, also known as Willian Je, has been charged with several fraud and money laundering charges.

Guo is also an associate of Steve Bannon, a longtime ally and former top aide to President Donald Trump.

Bannon was arrested in August 2020 aboard a yacht owned by Guo on charges related to a crowdsourced campaign to raise money to build barriers along the U.S.-Mexico border.