Yeung found guilty over laundering

Carson Yeung, owner of League Championship football side Birmingham and Hong Kong businessman, has been found guilty of money laundering by the Hong Kong District Court.

Yeung, who last month resigned from positions of power with the English second-tier club, was convicted over charges relating to his handling of 721 million Hong Kong dollars ($93 million) using five bank accounts between January 2001 and December 2007.

The tycoon will be sentenced on Friday and could face a maximum of seven years in jail whilst his father, Yeung Chung, a co-accused, died in 2012.

Yeung’s ‘hairdressing fortune’

Yeung was arrested and charged in Hong Kong in June 2011, two years after he acquired the club in a $130 million takeover in 2009.

At the time, he was only the second Asian, after deposed former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, to own a British premier league club.

He said he made HK$20 million as a hairdresser, catering to movie stars and businessmen from a chain of upmarket salons.

However, in his verdict District Court Judge Douglas Yau said there were reasonable grounds to believe that multiple business dealings with which Yeung was involved had made use of funds which represented “proceeds of an indictable offense.”