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Yunnan murder case is headed for retria

BEIJING - Li Changkui, a farmer who raped and murdered a teenager before killing her younger brother, is to be retried following a public outcry over the decision to revoke his death sentence.
The announcement on Sunday by the Yunnan provincial high people's court comes four months after its judges gave Li a two-year reprieve, reducing an earlier punishment handed down by a lower court.
The reprieve decision effectively means a life sentence, the usual outcome in China when a death penalty is delayed.
A date for the retrial is yet to be set, said Tian Chengyou, the court's deputy director.
"We want the death sentence restored," said Wang Yong, a Beijing-based attorney who is representing the victims' family.
During Li's trial at Zhaotong city's intermediate people's court last July, judges heard how the defendant murdered Wang Jiafei, 19, and 3-year-old Wang Jiahong over a feud with the Wang family.
Prosecutors said Li visited his neighbors' home in Qiaojia county, Yunnan, in May 2009 and got into an argument with Wang Jiafei. 
He raped her and beat her to death with a hoe, before killing her brother by smashing him into the ground.
He was sentenced to death and ordered to pay 30,000 yuan ($4,600) in compensation to Wang Tingli, the victims' father.
Yet, that punishment was reduced in March this year after the high people's court said it took into account the fact that Li had turned himself in to police and volunteered to compensate the Wang family. The compensation order remained unchanged.
The change in the sentence drew strong protests from the Wang family, who claimed Li only surrendered to authorities because he had nowhere to hide. In addition, they allege he was initially unwilling to pay compensation.
The case also drew huge public attention, with many people criticizing the decision to withdraw the death sentence.
On July 5, the high people's court said it would re-examine the ruling.
As of Sunday, the Wang family had received almost 50,000 yuan in donations from supporters, said Wang Tingli.

"We must have the death penalty (for Li)," he added.

6 jailed over South China city unrest

GUANGZHOU - Six people have received jail terms ranging from nine months to three and a half years over last month's unrest in a city in Guangdong Province, a local court said in a statement Tuesday.
The People's Court of Zengcheng City handed down the jail terms on Monday.
Li Zhonghuang, who was accused of destroying three police vehicles during the unrest in the town of Xintang on June 11, was sentenced to three and a half years.
Li led a group who threw stones and set vehicles on fire, according to the court document.
He was convicted on the charges of creating disturbances and destroying public property.
Four others were convicted on the same charges.
Kang Chuan, who smashed and overturned several police vehicles during the unrest near a shopping center in town, was sentenced to two and a half years.
Yang Fajun and Ran Qinghua, who threw stones at and smashed vehicles on a main highway in Xintang following the unrest, were sentenced to two years.
Ou Lin, who attempted to set parked cars on fire but was stopped by police, received a nine-month jail term.
Another suspect, Zhao Jiufu, was sentenced to two years for obstructing official affairs.
Zhao threw stones at police who were attempting to maintain order during the unrest. When a police officer tried to grab him, Zhao bit him on the stomach.
The defendants all confessed their crimes and pleaded guilty during the trial, the court document said.
Local police said last week altogether 11 suspects involved in the unrest were charged.
Several officials, including the secretary of Communist Party of China (CPC) Committee of Xintang, where the unrest occurred, and the town chief, had also been removed from their posts.
On June 10, a pregnant migrant woman and her husband from the southwestern Sichuan Province were involved in a dispute with a security personnel surnamed Lu.
Lu asked the couple to move their stall in front of a supermarket in Dadun Village of Xintang.
Irritated by the row, more than 100 migrant workers gathered in front of the supermarket for two days. Some of them hurled bottles and bricks at government officials and police vehicles.
They later marched toward the nearby Dadun public security station, damaging several police vehicles and private cars with rocks on their way.
Su Zhijia, deputy secretary of CPC committee of Guangzhou City, said the incident was triggered by mounting anger among migrant workers.
Su said public services for migrant workers needed to be improved to avoid further unrest.

Legal loophole adds to trauma in same-sex 'rape'
Yang Xiaolong (not his real name) sits in silence in his home in a village in Henan province on Tuesday. [Xiang Mingchao / China Daily]
Zhengzhou - "I was abducted by someone and the pain in my heart will last a lifetime! It's so hard to talk about " wrote Yang Xiaolong (not his real name) on his Tencent QQ, a popular instant messaging platform in China.
The 15-year-old from Xinmi, Henan province, fell victim to a rare case of same-gender sexual assault on the night of June 8, when 29-year-old Li Mu, the suspect, allegedly dragged him into his car at knifepoint and "raped" him in a nearby mountain area. The boy was held captive for six hours, and was not released until 5 am the next morning.
Huge controversies arose when reports said the local police, who claimed they could not find laws relating to forcible sex between people of the same gender, decided to put the suspect, who was detained on June 19, into administrative detention for only 15 days, a much lighter punishment designed for those guilty of misdemeanors.
According to Article 236 of China's Criminal Law, only women are defined as victims in the crime of rape, while the crime of coercive indecency toward children in article 237 does not define the age of a child and only juveniles under 14 are regarded as children in judicial practice.
"The police told me that despite the vile nature of the crime they could only detain the suspect for 'acting indecently toward other people', according to the relevant laws," said Jin Hongbing, Yang Xiaolong's uncle, who bought a law book, exhausted himself searching for relevant laws online and consulted several lawyers after the attack on his nephew, in an attempt to ensure the suspect received a heavier punishment.
"We could find no similar file cases and didn't know where to start," said Wei Wei, a spokesperson with Xinmi police. "Such a case is rare in China, so we dealt with it very cautiously."
According to Wei, the police sought instructions from higher authorities and held meetings with prosecutors to define the nature of the crime but received "quite different opinions".
The suspect was not transferred into criminal detention until Monday, only a few hours before he was to be released from administrative detention. The police said they had collected enough evidence by then to prove him guilty of "illegal detention".
"So far what we believe is that the suspect committed illegal detention and (we believe the judge) will give punishment according to the serious nature of the crime," Wei said, sidestepping the sexual assault part.
Jin Juhong, 45, did not know about her son's painful experience until the boy's elder sister, who inquired about it on seeing his QQ message, told her about his ordeal two days after the "rape".
"At first, his sister thought he was kidding," recalled the mother, who could not believe her ears, when she learned more through Yang Xiaolong's uncle, whom the boy trusted more than his parents.
"He covered his face when we tried to ask any more about it," said the mother, who took her son home on June 17 from Xinmi city, which is about 30 kilometers from their village. Yang had gone to Xinmi last year to receive training at a garage after dropping out of middle school. He boarded at his uncle's home there.
"Now the entire village knows it, and maybe the entire province of Henan," said Jin.
On Monday, in the 100 square meters or so of the muddy courtyard of their shabby cave-styled house, Yang Xiaolong's agitated family, including his parents and his 86-year-old grandmother, received psychological and legal counseling from a legal aid team and two psychological consultants.
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