Student Yang Li from China has been jailed for 12 months by a judge at Bristol Crown Court for trying to bribe his tutor. Li a student at Bath University was studying a masters in Innovation and Technology Management and needed 3% more on his dissertation to get the required 40% to pass. He consulted the faculty’s head, professor Andrew Graves to discuss possible options, and in that meeting, he produced a sum of £5,000 in a failed effort to increase his mark. 

近日一名巴斯大学的中国留学生李洋（音译）因试图贿赂教授失败被法官判处12个月的有期徒刑. 还差3分就能毕业的李这天来到办公室与教授讨论, 未久便从口袋掏出5000英镑现金甩在办公桌上说: “老师, 我是个生意人! 你要是给我过了我就不再烦你. ” 教授拒收贿款, 对李藐视英国大学教育制度和教授本人人格的行为表示失望, 并请他离开. 李行贿未果, 碰了钉子, 只好灰溜溜地把钱塞入口袋. 谁知这时一支BB枪(塑料汽弹枪)从其口袋滑出掉落地上. 见此教授怒火中烧, 立刻报警. 李最终自食其果, 因企图行贿及携带枪支的罪名被判处12个月的监禁.

事件发生之后, 很多中国留学生来信表示极为愤慨, 不敢相信竟然有这样的败类出现. 孙小姐说: “此事影响了咱们留学生的名誉, 其实行贿的例子应该是极少的. 如果他能行贿成功, 对我们这些勤奋学习的学生来说太不公平了.” 布大的张进佑说: “ 英国的评分制度还是很健全的, 幸亏有这样一位公正不阿的教授.”

Li told professor Andrew Graves  “I am a businessman”, then put £5,000 in cash on the table. “There is a fourth option, you can keep the money if you give me a pass mark and I won’t bother you again”.  His professor told him to leave and as Li put the money back into his own pocket, a BB gun accidentally fell out.

Judge Michael Longman told the student: “You attempted to persuade a university professor to behave in such a way that if it had been successful you would have undermined the integrity of the universities in the UK and the legitimacy of degrees from universities here, the University of Bath in particular. 

Your bid to achieve a pass mark by offering what was a bribe to your professor was ill conceived to the point of being a spectacular mistake and one which was doomed to fail from the start. You withdrew the large sum of money that morning, and I do not accept that offering the money was on impulse or done in the heat of the moment. It was planned and deliberate and demonstrated a failure to comprehend the high standards adhered to by the public and private offices in the UK. This was made even more serious by the fact that you had an imitation firearm in your possession. I have no doubt that it provoked fear in Professor Graves, though I am satisfied that you did not acquire it for the purpose of the meeting. But you plainly did know you had it on you, and you risked others at the meeting seeing it.”

Blake James, defending, said Li came from an affluent family in China, and his father is a respected government official and businessman. 

He said his client was used to carrying large amounts of cash and had the air pistol, used for shooting practice, was in his possession as he did not want to leave it in the car.

Mr James added Li was not a “sham student” and had come to the UK in 2006 for a computer science degree at the University of Bath, which he passed. “When he learned of the result of the dissertation it was a bitter blow to him,” Mr James said.

Li, 26, of Wellsway, Bath, admitted the charges against him and the judge sentenced him to 12 months for bribery and 6 months for the possession of an imitation firearm, which will run at the same time. Ironically he was ordered to pay the court costs which amounted to nearly £5,000.