Once upon a time, Weihong “Whitney” Duan was the poster woman for the Chinese dream.
After growing up poor, she wheeled and dealt her way to a billion-dollar fortune, making her name as China’s most successful female entrepreneur.
Then, on September 5, 2017, at age 50, she simply disappeared from the streets of Beijing.
The billionaire was last spotted the day before a huge project of hers came to fruition. Her maid also disappeared, causing wild speculation.
Weihong “Whitney” Duan was the poster woman for the Chinese dream. After growing up poor, she wheeled and dealt her way to a billion-dollar fortune making her name as China’s most successful female entrepreneur. Then, on September 5, 2017, at age 50, she simply disappeared from her streets of Beijing. Her ex-husband, Desmond Shum, recounts i his new book, Red Roulette, “She was last seen the day before in her sprawling office at Genesis Beijing, a $2.5 billion (AUD 3.3 billion) development project that she and I had built. There, Whitney had masterminded real estate projects worth billions more. And now suddenly she was gone.” The only clue that her husband had was that she was taken away, together with her maid in order to prevent any witness, by the Chinese secret police operating under Xi Jinping.