Chongqing's former director of the justice bureau and deputy police head Wen Qiang faces trial today for a host of charges including those linked to organized crime in the municipality.

Wen is accused of crimes that include graft, rape, covering up and conniving with mafia-style gangs, as well as possessing an exorbitant amount of suspicious assets, local news website cqnews.net reported.

The trial of Wen, dubbed "the most senior gang protector" in the region, follows his detention last August amid a slew of special operations by the authorities to crack down on gangs starting June, with nearly 2,000 suspects detained and 200 legal officials implicated for sheltering gangs.

The website did not give details of the evidence supporting the charges against Wen. The procuratorate and the court also could not provide the indictment to China Daily yesterday.

Wen, 54, from the local Ba'nan district, had served 11 years as deputy director of the municipal public security bureau till 2009 before serving as justice bureau director.

Beijing lawyer Wang Xianli from Joinway Law Firm told China Daily that the charges against Wen may be enough to give him a death sentence if he is convicted.

Wang said the ultimate penalty could be meted out to Wen for the single count of accepting a large amount of bribes, though the definition of "large amount" may vary from region to region in China.

Beijing News quoted an unnamed insider as saying that the indictment accused Wen of accepting a total of 18 million yuan ($2.63 million).

But precedence ruling will be favorable to Wen for this charge, said Wen's lawyer, Yang Kuangsheng. Yang last year succeeded in securing a death sentence with reprieve for the former director of the city's planning bureau, Jiang Yong, who was convicted of accepting 17.96 million yuan of bribes.

But Wang said a conviction for rape against Wen can add up to a death sentence for him, given its severity and the damage done to the victim.

Wen is accused of raping, under alcohol influence, a female college student and the duo had sex many times later, the Beijing News quoted the unnamed insider as saying.

The newspaper did not elaborate on the remaining charges against Wen, including the possession of an exorbitant amount of assets from unknown sources and the cover-up of mafia-style organizations.

Earlier, police investigation reportedly showed that Wen had served as protector for an intricate web of six mafia-style organizations, which were led by politically powerful business tycoons.

Death sentence?

An online poll on popular forum qq.com showed that 71 percent of the 2,180 people polled by 6 pm yesterday said they believed Wen will be executed immediately.

Fourteen percent said Wen will get death with reprieve, while 8 per cent said he will be sentenced to life imprisonment.

"Wen Qiang did not kill someone or set up a fire, so the death penalty would be too severe and unjust," said local bank clerk Tony Chen, 33.

"He will not live otherwise other corrupt senior officials who have dodged this wave of crackdowns cannot sleep soundly," a netizen Dayuebo posted on another popular forum.

"If Wen is sentenced to death, he will have more people buried alongside him as he will tell on other officials' misconduct," an online user who went by the name Bubiande No 23 said.

In the early days of Wen's detention, he threatened: "If you sentence me to death, I will tell everything so let's wait for death together," the Guangzhou Daily reported an unnamed police as repeating Wen's remarks.

The newspaper reported that Wen's attitude during subsequent police interrogations changed drastically.

In early September, "as Wen knew that his son who was conducting business in the United States had returned to Chongqing, his line of defense was wrecked completely. He cried remorsefully, saying he failed the Party and the organization, and became cooperative in interrogations", the newspaper quoted police as saying.