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The Crocker-McMillin mansion in Mahwah, New Jersey.
Source: Google EarthGuo Wengui’s 15-room residence overlooking New York’s Central Park became the center of attention Wednesday when a fire scorched the apartment just hours after the Chinese mogul was detained on fraud charges.
Prosecutors say the co-op, which is currently listed for sale at about $32 million, isn’t the only property that Guo owns in the tri-state area. In 2021, he bought a historic 50,000-square-foot (4,600-square-meter) mansion in Mahwah, New Jersey, for $26 million.
Guo Wengui at his New York apartment in 2017.
Photographer: Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images
With the help of his financial adviser, Guo fraudulently used funds raised from members of his G|Club to purchase the 58-room brick palace, as well as Chinese and Persian rugs, a $53,000 fireplace log holder and a $4.4 million Bugatti, federal prosecutors alleged. G/Club’s website describes it as “an exclusive, high-end membership program offering a full spectrum of services,” including travel, entertainment and wellness.
Guo, 54, hadn’t previously been identified as the owner of the New Jersey property, which made headlines in 2017 when it hit the market at $48 million, one of the priciest listings in the state. Bergen County property records show the house was sold by Crocker Mansion Estate LLC to Las Vegas-based Taurus Fund LLC on Dec. 29, 2021.
Known as the Crocker-McMillin mansion, the house was built in 1903 at the height of the Gilded Age by businessman George Crocker, who also added formal gardens and massive greenhouses. The estate was sold in 1926 to the Archdiocese of Newark, which built a dormitory, dining hall and chapel for seminary students, according to the National Registry of Historic Places.
The Crocker-McMillin mansion.
Source: DOJ
Guo was arrested at the Sherry-Netherland hotel by FBI agents at 6:24 a.m. on Wednesday, and brought before a judge over the alleged billion-dollar fraud.
Hours later, a two-alarm fire broke out on the hotel’s 18th floor, where Guo — also known as Miles Kwok — lives. The New York Fire Department is investigating.
Before the blaze, Guo had already slashed the asking price of the apartment, which he bought in 2015 for $67.5 million. It’s currently listed on Sherry Netherland’s website at $32 million.
Guo and his financial adviser, Kin Ming Je, were charged with conspiracy, wire and securities fraud and money laundering, according to a 38-page indictment unsealed Wednesday. Guo spent the night in jail, after pleading not guilty and consenting to detention, while Je remains at large, Manhattan US Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement.
Members of the FDNY respond to a fire in an apartment in the Sherry-Netherland building in New York, on March 15.
Photographer: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
The pair conspired to cheat thousands of victims out of more than $1 billion using “a series of complex fraudulent and fictitious businesses and investment opportunities,” prosecutors alleged. They used more than $300 million of proceeds to benefit themselves and their families, according to the indictment.
A sharp critic of the Chinese Communist Party, Guo was known for making claims of political corruption against high-level party officials, including on YouTube and Twitter.
The businessman, an associate of former White House strategist Steve Bannon, has long been the subject of legal wrangling. Living in exile in the US since 2015, he has seen his Chinese and Hong Kong assets frozen amid investigations into his finances. He sought political asylum in the US in 2017 after the regime sought to arrest him through Interpol.
