B.C. court rules man defrauded Chinese developers [Video]

A Vancouver man has been ordered to pay more than US$500,000 after a B.C. Supreme Court judge found he had defrauded the would-be developers of a real estate project in China of that amount.

In a decision issued earlier this week and published online Friday, Justice Neena Sharma ruled that Christopher Lee is liable to Hainan Dehong Real Estate Development Corporation and Hainan Kinghouse Real Estate Development Corporation for “fraud and/or fraudulent misrepresentation.” 

The two companies sued Lee – along with a mortgage brokerage and one of its contractors – for his role in an ultimately failed attempt to secure US$100 million in financing for a land development project on Hainan Island in China.

The development pitch

Sharma’s decision describes the two development corporations as “family companies” run by Cexen Fu, whose daughter Julie Fu lives in Vancouver and represented the plaintiffs at the trial.

In 2014, the younger Fu worked with a mortgage broker named Frank Lee – who is not related …