Hillary Clinton returns 850,000 dollars collected by fugitive

Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton is to return 850,000 dollars in campaign funds collected by a Hong Kong businessman detained on fraud charges, her office said Tuesday.

Norman Hsu surrendered to police on August 31 having been on the run from Californian authorities since 1992, after he failed to show up at a hearing into fraud charges against him.

Hsu, a naturalized US citizen who originates from Hong Kong, had helped to collect thousands of dollars at state and federal level for Clinton's campaign coffers since 2003.

His name recently appeared on the list of the Democratic Party's 20 top donors and several Democratic party politicians, including Clinton and her nearest rival for the 2008 nomination, Barack Obama, have said they would either return the money he collected or give it to charity.

"In light of recent events and allegations that Mr. Norman Hsu engaged in an illegal investment scheme, we have decided out of an abundance of caution to return the money he raised for our campaign," Clinton's spokesman Howard Wolfson said in a statement.

"Despite conducting a thorough review of public records, our campaign, like these others, were unaware of Mr. Hsu's decade-plus old warrant."

He added some 260 donors would receive refunds totaling about 850,000 dollars. The same donors could however choose to make out a new check for Clinton's campaign.