A YOUNG woman in Shenzhen was recently ordered by a court to return money to her lover for being the married man’s mistress. The money required was used by the man to buy the woman an apartment and pay the down payment on a car.

    On March 6, the husband, known as Geng, confessed to his wife that he had been dating his mistress since 2009 and bought her an apartment and a car.

    When Geng’s wife learned that her husband had spent nearly 2 million yuan (US$290,000) on the 25-year-old woman over the past few years, she lodged a lawsuit against him and the woman for using the couple’s joint property.

    According to the wife’s prosecution, Geng spent over 1.63 million yuan to buy property in Bao’an District for his mistress in 2014. He also shouldered a 50,000 yuan down payment to buy a sedan for the young woman. Additionally, the man gave more than 140,000 yuan to the woman in cash or via bank transactions while secretly dating her.

    All of the money used on the young woman was considered the common property of the couple, thus the court should order the mistress to return the money, according to the wife.

    Although the young woman defended herself by saying that it was Geng who approached her and concealed the fact that he was married, the Bao’an District People’s Court ordered the mistress to return a total of 1.85 million yuan to the couple.

    The court decided on the ruling because Geng and his wife were in a legal marriage relationship and the property earned during their marriage was considered common property between the two. The fact that Geng had been maintaining an illegal relationship with another woman had violated the marriage law.

    (Zhang Qian)