Former celebrity linked to illegal diet food case

Seventy-five people suspected of producing and selling diet food with illegal additives have been busted, Shanghai's Pudong district police said on Monday.

More than 50 million yuan ($7.63 million) was involved in the case, which was reported to police by internet users in December. Police staged a raid in the middle of last month that nabbed more than 30 people.

On March 18, police disclosed only the surnames and ages of those arrested. A report by ThePaper.cn, an online media outlet, at the time said it had been confirmed that a 30-year-old suspect surnamed Guo was former convict and internet celebrity Guo Meimei. It repeated that assertion in a report on Monday.

Police said the diet food products were mainly sold through social media and that a woman surnamed Guo was one of those who posted advertisements for the product online.

The only ingredient effective for weight loss in the capsules was sibutramine, a banned substance that acts on the central nervous system to suppress appetite. The drug has been banned in China since 2010.

"The banned substance could cause weight loss of nearly 2 kilograms every day but it can cause side effects, including high blood pressure, increased heart rate, and can cause death in severe cases," Huang Shuaishuai, a police officer investigating the case, said in a news release issued on Monday.

All the members of the gang were aware that the forbidden substance was used as an ingredient but did not stop because they were making good profits. Each capsule cost less than 1 yuan ($0.15) to produce but sold for 69 yuan.

There were three production sites. Twenty-four sales sites involved in the case were scattered in Sichuan and Yunnan provinces in the country's southwest and Shandong province in the east.

When raiding the sites in mid-March, police discovered more than 65,000 toxic capsules, around 34 kilograms of raw materials, three pieces of production equipment and more than 20,000 pieces of outer packaging. The police did not say when the gang began producing the illegal products or how many had been sold.

The case went viral online on Monday owing to the alleged involvement of Guo, who was sentenced to five years in prison in 2015 by a Beijing court for operating gambling houses.

She first became a national internet celebrity in 2011 when she claimed on social media to be the general manager of a company called Red Cross Commerce. She was high-profile about showing off her luxury possessions, including a Maserati and a Lamborghini, as well as a palatial villa and an extravagant lifestyle.

Both the Red Cross Society and Guo later denied having any ties with one another. However, her posts still triggered public concerns about how the charitable organization used its donations. A subsequent investigation found that Guo had no connection to the society.

Guo came under public scrutiny again in 2014 after Beijing police uncovered an internet soccer gambling group during the World Cup.

zhouwenting@chinadaily.com.cn