Macau's highest court on Thursday sentenced a former minister to 29 years in jail for bribery and money laundering, in the biggest-ever corruption probe to take place in the world's top gaming hub.
The Court of Final Appeal found former transport and public works minister Ao Man-long, who is already serving a lengthy jail sentence for other offences, guilty of nine charges, a Macau government official said.
"He was convicted of three counts of money laundering and six counts of bribe-taking. He was sentenced to 29 years in jail and a fine of 240,000 patacas ($30,000)," the official told AFP after the verdict was handed down.
Ao is currently serving a 28-and-a-half year jail term after he was convicted on corruption charges in 2009 for taking payments from contractors in return for approving either land sales or major construction projects in Macau.
The official told AFP that the sentences will be run concurrently.
In the latest trial, Ao had denied receiving HK$20 million ($2.6 million) from two Hong Kong tycoons for the acquisition of a plot of land on which a HK$20 billion luxury residential project was being built.
Ao was first arrested in December 2006 by the Macau Commission Against Corruption. He had amassed a personal fortune of more than $100 million in his seven years in office -- 57 times his family's income during that time.
The case has cast a shadow over the former Portuguese colony, one hour away by ferry from Hong Kong, which has struggled to shake of its "Sin City" image, despite attracting huge amounts of foreign investment.