Hong Kong (CNN) -- The former Chinese police chief who attempted to defect to the United States, triggering one of China's biggest political scandals, has been jailed for 15 years. 
 
 Wang Lijun, who was tried last week, was found guilty by the Chengdu City Intermediate People's Court of bending the law for selfish ends, defection, abuse of power and bribe-taking, court spokesman Yang Yuquan said Monday. 
 
 Until he sought refuge at the U.S. Consulate in February, Wang was the right-hand man of disgraced Chongqing Party chief Bo Xilai, who was stripped of his titles in April because of an unspecified "serious breach of party discipline." Bo has not been seen in public since. 
 
 Wang, 52, could have faced execution, since bribe-taking can carry the death penalty in China, depending on the amount involved and the seriousness of the case. Wang was accused in court of accepting bribes and property worth around 3.05 million yuan (around U.S. $480,000) for personal favors. 
 
 He received nine years for this offense, with a further seven added for "bending" the law, two for defection and two years for abuse of power -- though the court decided on a "combined" term of 15 years, taking into account his cooperation with authorities, Yang told reporters. He was also stripped of his "political rights" for one year. 
 
 Read more: Wang Lijun: the cop at the heart of Bo scandal 
 
 Wang didn't contest the charges, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency, which published details of the case. Wang has no plans to appeal the sentence, Yang said Monday. 
 
 The case also brought to light the first suggestion that Bo knew as early as January that his wife, Gu Kailai, was suspected of murder. 
 
 Read more: China's Bo Xilai 'implicated' in murder 
 
 After a one-day trial in August, Gu was found guilty of poisoning British businessman Neil Heywood in a hotel room in Chongqing last November. During her trial, she admitted pouring poison into his mouth, provided by a family aide who was also convicted of the crime. 
 
 According to Xinhua, prosecutors said Wang knew "perfectly well" that Gu was suspected of murder, but deliberately covered up for her so she would not be held legally responsible for Heywood's death -- a fact that was repeated during Monday's court session, Yang said. 
 
 Read more: Bo looms large over party leadership 
 
 The court was told that Wang later abandoned his efforts to conceal her crime when relations between the two became strained. 
 
 Wang said in his confession that Gu "turned hostile toward me, taking a different attitude from before when contacting me. She was not so warm as before and began to guard herself against me," Xinhua said. She was worried about her crime being exposed, and he was "not pleased" that Gu had told an increasing number of people about the incident. 
 
 Read more: Gu Kailai, the woman who had it all 
 
 Then in late January, Wang told "the then leading official of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Chongqing Committee" -- the position Bo held -- that Gu was "highly suspected" of having murdered Heywood, Xinhua said. 
 
 A witness, Guo Weiguo, testified that the official "angrily rebuked" Wang, before slapping him in the face. "The conflict was made public after Wang Lijun was slapped," Guo said. 
 
 After Wang's run-in with Bo, he instructed his staff to "rearrange" Heywood's case file. Shortly after, he was demoted and three members working closely with Wang were put under "illegal investigation." "Wang felt he was in danger, giving rise to his idea to defect," Xinhua said. 
 
 On February 6, Wang entered the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu, where he said his life was in danger and asked officials to fill out an application for political asylum. The next day, however, he was persuaded to leave the consulate and was taken into custody by Chinese officials. 
 
 In his final statement to the court, Wang was reported to have apologized for his crimes, saying, "I hope the serious impacts (caused by my acts) both at home and abroad would be eliminated through the trial. Meanwhile, I hope the trial will issue a warning to society and let more people draw lessons from me. 
 
 "For the Party organizations, people and relatives that have cared for me, I want to say here, sincerely, 'I'm very, very sorry, I've let you down,' " Wang added. 
 
 At the close of the trial, Wang's defense team pleaded for leniency in sentencing on the defection charge on the grounds that Wang left the U.S. Consulate of his own volition. They also said he provided key evidence to help authorities secure Gu's conviction for murder and on that basis his crime of bending the law for personal gain "could be lighter." The court accepted these arguments and sentenced him "leniently," Yang said Monday. 
 
 Wang's decision to seek refuge in the U.S. Consulate brought the case into public view and led to Bo's high-profile demise. 
 
 Until the case was exposed, Bo was considered a top contender for the Politburo Standing Committee, the team of nine politicians who effectively rule China. China's Communist Party is expected to meet at its 18th National Congress next month to announce who'll occupy the top positions. 
 
 Bo, 63, was a charismatic, albeit controversial politician, who launched a "smashing black, singing red" campaign in Chongqing that promoted communist ideology and zealously cracked down on organized crime. 
 
 His economic programs, which included millions spent on social welfare, made him a popular leader in Chongqing. But analysts say his populist policies and high-profile personal style were seen as a challenge to the more economically liberal and reform-oriented faction that dominated the current party leadership. 
 
 Bo and Wang were known to have worked closely on Bo's signature crime-fighting program in 2009. In just 10 months, Chongqing police arrested almost 5,000 people and executed more than a dozen. ||||| A TV screen shows a news report of disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai in Hong Kong on Aug. 22. (Photo: Vincent Yu, AP) Story Highlights Bo Xilai faces charges of bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power 
 
 Abuse of power charge relates to coverup of the murder of a British businessman 
 
 Saturday will be the third day of the trial 
 
 BEIJING — The widely watched corruption trial of maverick Chinese politician Bo Xilai, once tipped for the top echelons of Communist Party power, will resume for a third day Saturday after Bo continued his feisty defense Friday against charges of bribery and embezzlement. 
 
 Two earlier trials connected to Bo, of his now jailed wife Gu Kailai and police chief Wang Lijun, were completed in one or two days. Before Bo's trial, many analysts expected it to prove equally quick and state-scripted. 
 
 A guilty verdict and long jail sentence remain the most likely outcomes, but authorities are taking longer to deal with the confident and articulate man at the heart of China's biggest political scandal for decades. 
 
 Bo, 64, rejected the testimony of both Gu and Wang on Friday. The other charge he faces, of abuse of power relating to a murder committed by Gu, and initially covered up by Wang, has not been addressed by the court. 
 
 Nationwide, the focus again fell on the official micro-blog account of court proceedings that offer a level of public access and information highly unusual here. The court played a video testimony, also released online, in which Gu Kailai claimed Bo knew about payments to his family from a billionaire businessman. 
 
 Bo responded sharply by calling his wife "insane" and claimed she had once told him that when she killed the British businessman Neil Heywood she felt as heroic as a famous assassin who tried to kill China's first emperor. That proved she was not in a sane state of mind, said Bo, whose last post was Communist Party boss of China's largest city, Chongqing. 
 
 The micro-blog feed gave millions of Chinese citizens another fascinating day's peek into the privileged and usually highly secretive lives of China's power elite. Testimony from Gu and other witnesses suggested the Bo family enjoyed luxuries and lifestyles far beyond most Chinese citizens and the modest official salary Bo earned. 
 
 Businessman Xu Ming allegedly bought gifts, including an expensive Segway scooter for the couple's son, and paid for his international trips, including to the soccer World Cup in Germany and a trip for six to Africa that cost $130,841. The son, Bo Guagua, safe from Chinese prosecutors in the USA, where he will soon study law, brought home gifts from Africa, including "a piece of meat from a very exotic animal," Gu said. 
 
 The micro-blog highlighted the human drama that brought down the high-flying house of Bo. Testimony described the real estate and rental dispute with Heywood that upset Gu's relationship with the Briton. She said she felt Heywood was threatening Bo Guagua's life. "We were worried that Guagua would be kidnapped and killed in the USA," she said. 
 
 Her worries about Guagua's safety "led to the Nov. 15 case," she said in reference to the day when she had an aide pour poison down Heywood's throat after she got him drunk. 
 
 Though Bo dismissed her testimony, and his lawyer said it should be discounted as she was on medication for mental illness, Gu appeared lucid and calm in the 11-minute video shot Aug. 10. Her performance impressed some observers. 
 
 "Bo Gu Kailai is very elegant and calm, working as a lawyer must have increased her charm, it's a pity," wrote Zhan Jiang, professor of journalism at Beijing's Foreign Studies University, on his Sina Weibo micro-blog. 
 
 Many Chinese Internet users welcomed as progress the authorities' unprecedented move to micro-blog the trial. Some analysts, conscious of the Communist Party's penchant for stage-managing public events, warned that the micro-blog feed was selective and not as transparent as a real-time, live television broadcast. 
 
 "This method of live coverage achieves a balance between openness and control, brings about the form of trial reporting, and implements the strategy of guiding public opinion," said Zhang Zhi'an, a journalism professor at Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, on his Sina Weibo micro-blog. 
 
 "It reflects openness but controls risks, with superb skill," wrote Zhang, who suggested the court's feed should be called "micro-blog reporting" not live coverage. 
 
 Chen Youxi, a lawyer based in the eastern city of Hangzhou, praised the blog feed for making the trial public. "I hope the verdict could be wholly decided by the full court according to facts proved by investigation and evidence, without too many political factors," he wrote in an analysis of day one on his Sina blog. 
 
 "Bo Xilai became famous because he trampled down rule of law years ago, now he plays another role to promote the progress of rule of law in China. History truly is so paradoxical," Chen said. 
 
 The coverage surprised many observers. 
 
 "They actually went live with the trial. It's absolutely unprecedented and indicates some confidence by the authorities," said Chen Jianfu, an expert in Chinese law at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. 
 
 The trial also exposed weaknesses in implementing the rule of law, Chen said, such as the prosecution's use of confessions obtained when Bo was under party detention and had not been transferred to judicial authorities. This is illegal under China's own Criminal Procedure Law. 
 
 Though many Chinese online praised Bo's courtroom performance, the state-run media predictably criticized his efforts. The Guangming Daily newspaper called him a liar Friday, and the party flagship People's Daily newspaper ran a commentary online that described Bo's defense as "futile quibbling." 
 
 Hu Xijin, editor of the Global Times, a highly popular and nationalistic newspaper, wrote on his widely followed micro-blog that, whatever the final verdict, Bo must sincerely apologize to the Chinese people and the Communist Party for discrediting the party and the government.
– The one-time Chinese police chief who blew the whistle on the Bo Xilai murder scandal has been sentenced to 15 years in prison. Wang Lijun, who attempted earlier this year to defect to the US, was sentenced today by the Chengdu City Intermediate People's Court for bending the law for selfish ends, defection, abuse of power, and taking some $480,000 in bribes, reports CNN. The sentence was considered lenient, given that he could have been sentenced to death for the bribes alone, reports the New York Times. Wang, 52, was the right-hand man of now disgraced former Chongqing Party chief Bo Xilai, whose wife, Gu Kailai, was handed a suspended death sentence last month for the murder of family associate and British businessman Neil Heywood. Bo hasn't been seen in public for several months. Wang's trial indicated the next court target will likely be Bo, reports Reuters. The murder scandal, the biggest to hit Chinese politics in years, was blown open by Wang, who told US diplomats when he attempted to defect at the Chengdu consulate that Gu had poisoned Heywood late last year. The US refused to grant Wang asylum and turned him over to Beijing authorities. Bo was bounced from the Chongqing top post and from the Politburo a short time later.