Peter William Humphrey

In March 2013, secretly filmed sex tapes of Mark Rilley, GlaxoSmithKline's then head in China, were emailed to 13 senior executives of the company, including the CEO Andrew Witty, in March 2013.[10][11] According to The Sunday Times, the videos were accompanied by detailed accusations of the company's "pervasive bribery" in China made by an anonymous writer called "gskwhistleblower".[11]

Since April 2013, ChinaWhys was paid by British drug maker GlaxoSmithKline to investigate into the source of the sex tapes.[12] Humphrey submitted his report on 6 June 2013 to GlaxoSmithKline about his results of investigations.[13] The Sunday Times said that Humphrey was unaware of the company's bribery allegations until June.[11] In the same month, the Chinese police made public their investigations into GlaxoSmithKline's bribery in China.[14]

In July, the case went into legal processes. On 18 August 2013, Humphrey and his wife were arrested by Shanghai police. In May 2014, Mark Rilley was arrested due to allegations he was directly involved in and encouraged bribery.[15]

He was initially held at the Shanghai Detention Center and later moved to Qingpu Prison.[16]

The Humphrey couple was arrested in August 2013, yet the formal prosecution was not made until July 2014 when the couple was accused of "illegal acquisition of personal data of Chinese citizens."[17] On 8 August 2014, Humphrey and his wife were tried in No. 1 Intermediate People's Court of Shanghai Municipality. For the case was the first case of "illegal acquisition of personal data" in China that involved foreign citizens, the trial was made public on Weibo, which also made the case the first broadcast trial of crimes involving foreigners.[9]

Relatives of defendants, representatives of the UK and US consulates, deputies to National People's Congress, member of the CPPCC, ordinary Shanghai citizens, and Chinese media were present in the trial, while foreign media was excluded as requested by Humphrey.[9] The persecutor said that Humphrey and his wife were paid by several clients to investigate into personal data of Chinese companies and Chinese citizens illegally and sold them to their clients, during which they earned several million RMB.[9][8] According to Xinhua, a state run media agency, the information included the family member's information, the content of the household register, the information of real estate ownership, car ownership, telephone records, and the records of leaving and entering China. The information were said to be acquired through illegal trade, secret filming and stalking.[17] The court made the ruling that Humphrey should be held for 2 and a half years in prison and pay a fine of 200 thousand RMB before deported from China.[9]

Although his wife Yu Yingzeng was a US citizen, the court considered her personal conditions and criminal conditions and did not expel her from China.[12] Yu said she never knew acquiring third-hand personal data was illegal in Mainland China and admitted they had done similar investigations in Hong Kong and other areas. Humphrey once said during his detention before the trial that he was deceived by GlaxoSmithKline, which did not tell him details of the severity of the company's bribery.[18][19]

According to Chinese media The Paper, a former Chinese female executive at GlaxoSmithKline China's government affairs department who was born in 1964, should have been involved in reporting the company's bribery to the senior executives of the company and the Chinese government, as said by some employees of other foreign pharmaceutical companies in China interviewed by The Paper. According to the Financial Times, Humphrey explained that Vivian Shi had used her connections to the communist party elite to have him jailed.[20] He was told she managed to acquire a copy of Humphrey's report. Humphrey believed she was the whistleblower.[19]

In June 2015, Humphrey was released ahead of schedule due to health issues. Then he was sent to a Shanghai hospital to make a diagnosis about cancer. After leaving the hospital, he was deported from China. His wife was released the same month.[15][21] The UK Consulate in Shanghai prepared them with new passports for emergency so that they could return to the UK.[14] Humphrey was banned from entering China for 10 years. After returning to the UK, the couple still faced health and financial difficulties. Humphrey was diagnosed with prostate cancer, which Humphrey claimed to be worsened by poor conditions and delayed treatment in the prison. He also claims he was denied medical care in order to pressure him to confess. In March 2017, they sued GlaxoSmithKline as they believed that GlaxoSmithKline misled them to unpredictable legal risk and sought for compensations, while GlaxoSmithKline believed such accusation to be unreasonable.[22]

After returning to the UK, Humphrey maintained his innocence and argued that his confession was forced and the broadcast footage by CCTV was doctored.[23] In 2020, UK watchdog, Ofcom, ruled that broadcasting the footage violated British broadcasting regulations and Humphrey's privacy and that the station would be sanctioned.[24]