A Chinese court will issue its verdict next week in the murder trial of Gu Kailai, the wife of disgraced former Communist Party leader Bo Xilai.

A local government official said Friday that the Intermediate People's Court in Hefei, where Gu's 7-hour trial was held on August 9, will issue its verdict Monday.

Experts say a guilty verdict is in little doubt after Chinese state media said Gu confessed to the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood during her trial and vowed to accept her sentence. The Xinhua news agency reported that Gu said she poisoned Heywood as the result of a “mental breakdown.”

Gu is thought to have lured Heywood, her business partner at the time, to a hotel in the southwestern city of Chongqing last November, getting him drunk and poisoning him.

Gu's husband, Bo Xilai, was a rising star in the Communist Party, but was removed as Chongqing party chief after the allegations against his wife surfaced.