Close family friendship with China's ailing paramount leader Deng Xiaoping was not enough to get Chinese businessman Zhou Beifang off the hook. Zhou, former head of all five Hong Kong based subsidiaries of the giant Shougang Steel Works and close associate of Deng's son, had appealed his bribery conviction to the Supreme People's Court, which upheld the lower court's ruling. He was sentenced to death, with a commutation to life imprisonment if he shows good behavior for two years. Zhou's father, Zhou Guanwu, was forced to retire last year from his chairmanship of the Shougang Steel Works due to a "lust for personal power." Old age and personal friendship with Deng Xiaoping since the 1930s apparently shielded the senior Zhou from direct legal action. This did not extend to his son.