A leading San Jose City Council candidate worked under a Chinese billionaire arrested on bribery and corruption charges — mainly helping the embattled CEO’s company sell off land from his failed developments in the Bay Area.
San Jose Planning Commissioner George Casey, who’s locked in a heated race to replace District 10 Councilmember Arjun Batra, advised a company belonging to Zhang Li, the former co-chairman and CEO of Chinese developer Guangzhou R&F Properties. Its U.S. affiliate, Z&L Properties Inc., developed a string of controversial projects in the South Bay including “ Slavery Towers ” — the site of the city’s largest labor trafficking project that harbored undocumented workers in shipping containers and forced them to work for free.
Casey worked for Z&L Properties between June 2021 and December 2022, he confirmed to San José Spotlight. He said his role as a senior development manager involved helping Li sell his properties to other developers. Casey, a corporate lawyer and realtor, maintains he joined Z&L after Li’s admitted bribery of San Francisco officials from 2015-2020 — and that his role was to help Z&L get out of the San Jose market.