Slaying suspect isn’t a donor, Liberals say

The B.C. Liberal Party says a fundraising event organizer has confirmed alleged murderer Li Zhao is not the man who donated $14,000 to the party last May.

Elections B.C. records accessible to the public show a “Li Zhao” donated $14,000 to the B.C. Liberals on May 12, 2015, and a “Li Zhao” also donated $1,000 to the party in a Vancouver riding in 2005.

Chinese mining tycoon Gang Yuan was found killed and allegedly chopped into 100 pieces in his British Properties mansion on May 2, 2015. A relative of Yuan named Li Zhao, 55, was charged in connection with his murder and dismemberment.

B.C. Liberal spokeswoman Jillian Stead said the party has investigated and has established Li Zhao, the $14,000 party donor, is from Hong Kong and the alleged murderer Li Zhao is from Mainland China.

“There is privacy around our donors, but the relationship that this Li Zhao, our donor, has to our party has been confirmed by the event organizer and we have been able to trace him back to an identity that is not consistent to the Li Zhao murder suspect.”

Public donation records cannot confirm whether the “Li Zhao” listed twice as a B.C. Liberal donor is the same person or where the person lives in B.C.

Stead said the party could not say whether the donations attributed to “Li Zhao” come from the same person. But the donor “Li Zhao” lists two different addresses in B.C., Stead said.

Elections B.C. records show that on May 12, 2015, five donors with names common to Mainland China made large individual donations totalling $82,000 to the B.C. Liberal Party.

More than 30 entities donated $105,000 to the party that day, records show.

The B.C. Liberal Party did not respond to questions about who organized and hosted the events associated with those large individual donations.