In May 2007, Zheng was convicted of taking bribes and dereliction of duty and sentenced to death by a trial court in Beijing.[6][7] He had taken bribes totaling more than 6.49 million RMB (or a rough equivalent of 850,000 USD) from eight pharmaceutical companies in exchange for personally approving unproven and unsafe medicines while working as the head of China's ministry of food and drug safety.[8]: 87 These approvals caused the deaths of over 800 people in Panama from cough syrup that contained diethylene glycol in place of glycerin.[9][10] It was also discovered that during the eight-year period of drug oversight, Zheng personally ordered approvals of more than 150,000 new medicines, a number 134-times that of the U.S. FDA (which approves, on average, ca. 140 new medicines annually). Most of those 150,000 medicines were the products of the eight pharmaceutical companies that bribed Zheng. A single unsafe medication of Anhui Huayuan (华源) Worldbest Biology Pharmacy, since closed, resulted in 14 patient deaths, hundreds being permanently disabled, and several thousand more falling seriously ill; Anhui Huayuan's CEO committed suicide before his arrest.[11] Zheng's trial resulted in a death sentence. He was also ordered to forfeit all of his property.[2][12]
Cao Wenzhuang, a former director of the same agency's department dealing with drug registrations was also sentenced to death in the first week of July, 2007, for dereliction of duty and accepting bribes.[13] Cao had accepted more than two million RMB (or a rough equivalent of 250,000 USD). Cao received a two-year "reprieve" for his death sentence, "a ruling that usually [results in the death sentence being] commuted to life in prison if the convict is deemed to have reformed."[13][14]
Zheng entered an appeal for leniency on June 12, saying that the sentence was "too severe" citing the fact that he had confessed his crimes and cooperated with investigators. However, the court ruled that while these were indeed mitigating factors, his crimes were far too serious to warrant leniency, and he was a "great danger" to the country and its reputation. The appeal was rejected on June 22 and he was executed on July 10, 2007.[1][15]Lethal injection was used for the execution. In a note written before his execution, Zheng said he was sorry for what he had done.[16][17][18][19]
^Yang, Dali (2009). "Regulatory Learning and Its Discontents in China: Promise and Tragedy at the State Food and Drug Administration", in Pushing Back Globalization (Gillespie, John & Peerenboom, Randall, eds.) New York: Taylor & Frances/Routledge.[full citation needed]
