Roughly four months after JD.com’s billionaire CEO Richard Liu was arrested and later released by Minneapolis police on suspicion of alleged sexual misconduct, local authorities say they will not be charging him in a sexual misconduct case. In a statement, Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman said it was not possible to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the charges brought against Liu.
“As is the case in many sexual assault incidents, it was a complicated situation,” said Freeman in the release. “It is also similar to other sexual assault cases with the suspect maintaining the sex was consensual.”
An attorney for the accuser — a Chinese undergraduate who was studying at the University of Minnesota this fall — warned in an interview with the WSJ that “her story will be told.”
According to audio recordings reviewed by the WSJ, the woman told police that she attended a dinner with Liu and his associates on August 30th, and that Liu raped her in her home afterward.
JD.com, one of China’s largest online retailers, has from the outset called the accusations unsubstantiated, with Liu denying all wrongdoing.