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“Worse case fear confirmed,” his aunt, Lauri Nelson-Jones, told the National Post Monday. “Our thoughts are with Robert at this time. It is rather unimaginable what he must be feeling and thinking. It is a horrific, unfortunate, heartbreaking situation.”

Schellenberg was sentenced just two months ago to 15 years in prison for his part in an alleged operation to dispatch 200 kilograms of crystal meth from the port city of Dalian to Australia, the case unfolding mostly in obscurity since his 2014 arrest.

Photo by CCTV via AP

But late last month, Chinese media suddenly publicized his appeal hearing, and then the appeal court unexpectedly ordered a retrial at the urging of prosecutors who wanted a tougher penalty.

The retrial was scheduled for barely two weeks later, and the verdict and sentence were reportedly handed down Monday with little deliberation.

Unlike one of the other accused in the case, Schellenberg’s death sentence did not come with a two-year suspension, which usually results in the penalty being commuted to life in prison, noted Margaret Lewis, a law professor at New Jersey’s Seton Hall University and an expert on the Chinese legal system.

He can appeal, and all death penalties are reviewed – and invariably confirmed – by the Supreme People’s Court, but without political intervention, his prospects look grim, she said.

“Unless there is some dramatic turn of events, this is marching toward execution in the not too distant future,” said Lewis. “This is the most severe sentence allowed under Chinese law. It is death, with execution (after) crossing the Ts and dotting the Is.”