Nina Wang, 69; wealthy Hong Kong developer’s life was like a Hollywood film

Nina Wang, a Hong Kong businesswoman who turned her slain husband’s fortune into a real estate empire and became one of the world’s richest women, has died. She was 69.

Wang’s spokesman, Ringo Wong, said she died Tuesday. He did not announce a cause of death, but Hong Kong media reported that Wang had ovarian cancer that spread to her liver and other organs.

Wang’s rise to become Asia’s richest woman, according to Forbes Asia, had the plot elements of a Hollywood movie: sex, romance, crime and courtroom drama.

Born Kung Yu-sam in Shanghai, Wang moved to Hong Kong in the 1950s with Teddy Wang, who founded the Chinachem Group, which started as a pharmaceutical company.

Teddy Wang was abducted in 1983. The family paid an $11-million ransom for his return. Seven years later, he was abducted a second time as he left Hong Kong’s exclusive Jockey Club. The family paid a $33-million ransom but never saw him again.

Several of the kidnappers were apprehended and said the 56-year-old Wang had been thrown into the sea from the sampan -- a small Chinese boat -- where he was being held.

His body was never found, and he was declared dead in 1999.

Nina Wang insisted that she believed Teddy Wang was alive and would return someday.

In her husband’s absence, Nina Wang built Chinachem into a massive private-property development firm, with office towers and apartment complexes throughout Hong Kong.

This year, Forbes magazine ranked her as the world’s 204th richest person, with a fortune of $4.2 billion.

Wang captivated the public with her pigtails and garish, girlish outfits. She was nicknamed “Little Sweetie,” the Chinese name of a princess-like character from a Japanese fairy tale cartoon.

Despite her flamboyant exterior, she kept a fairly low profile and was viewed as a workaholic.

Her standing came under threat when her father-in-law, Wang Din-shin, challenged her claim to his late son’s fortune.

Wang Din-shin, who was in his 90s, claimed that he was the sole beneficiary of Teddy Wang’s estate, based on a 1968 will.

He questioned a will dated a month before his son disappeared, which left everything to Nina Wang. All four documents in the will contained the handwritten message “one life, one love,” in English on papers that were otherwise in Chinese.

After a 171-day trial during which Wang Din-shin showed pictures of Nina Wang with an alleged lover, a Hong Kong judge ruled in 2002 that the will designating Nina Wang as beneficiary was fake and that she “probably” forged part of it.

The love messages seemed suspiciously out of place, the judge said.

Prosecutors charged her with forgery in January 2005 in a separate criminal case. She was released on $7-million bail, a record for Hong Kong at the time.

Nina Wang, however, staged a legal comeback.

Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal reversed the ruling that gave the estate to Wang Din-shin, saying the signatures on the will appeared authentic.

“Such naturalness and style of writing is inconsistent with that of a person trying to commit a forgery,” Judge Patrick Chan said.

Wang was also cleared of forgery charges in December 2005.

The couple had no children. She is reportedly survived by at least one brother.