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One China's judicial body has handed down death sentences to several prominent individuals of an infamous Burmese mafia to death as Beijing persists in its campaign on scam activities in South East Asia.

Overall, 21 Bai family figures and partners were convicted of fraud, homicide, injury and various crimes, stated a state media announcement published on the judicial portal.

The family is among a small number of organized crime groups that rose to power in the 2000s and changed the impoverished isolated region of Laukkaing into a profitable center of casinos and red-light districts.

In recent years they turned to scams in which many of illegally moved workers, a large number of them from China, are ensnared, abused and obligated to cheat victims in illegal activities worth billions of dollars.

Specifics of the Sentencing

Mafia boss the patriarch and his offspring Bai Yingcang were among the five figures condemned to capital punishment by the judicial body. Another individual, A third figure and A fourth person were the additional convicted.

Two figures of the clan mafia were given conditional death penalties. Five were condemned to life in prison, while additional individuals were received prison terms varying from a period of 3-20 years.

The Bais, who led their own armed group, established forty-one compounds to host their online fraud operations and gambling houses, government stated.

Magnitude of Illegal Schemes

Such criminal activities entailed over 29 billion Chinese yuan ($4.1 billion; over three billion pounds). These activities also caused the deaths of six from China individuals, the suicide of an individual and multiple harm, state media stated.

The severe penalties handed down by the judicial body are part of China's initiative to remove the vast fraud operations in Southeast Asia - and issue a firm message to additional unlawful organizations.

Context of the Clans

These clans became dominant in the recent decades with the assistance of a military leader - who is in charge of Myanmar's military government. The leader had intended to support partners in Laukkaing after replacing its earlier warlord.

Within the clans, the Bais were "the most powerful", Bai Yingcang before told official sources.

Back then, our Bai family was the dominant in each of the government and armed arenas," the individual remarked in a report about the Bai family, aired on official channels in July.

Within that report, a employee at a fraud facilities described the abuse he had experienced there: besides being assaulted, he had his fingernails extracted with pliers and a couple of his digits amputated with a tool.

Further Charges

Bai Yingcang is included in those who were sentenced to execution in the latest ruling. The individual has also been separately found guilty of organizing to traffic and make a large quantity of illegal drugs, official sources stated.

Downfall of the Groups

Their fall happened in last year as circumstances altered.

For years Beijing has urged the Myanmar junta to limit scam operations in Laukkaing.

Last year, the law enforcement released detention orders for the key members of such clans.

Bai Suocheng, the Bai family's leader, was included in the figures who were handed to Beijing from Myanmar in the beginning of the year.

"Why is the authorities making such extensive work to go after the four families?" a expert commented in the summer documentary.

The purpose is to caution groups, no matter your position, where you are, if you engage in such terrible acts targeting the Chinese people, you will pay the price."