Guizhou court upholds suspended death sentence of man who killed wife, son
By CAO YIN | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2023-09-06 16:18
A court in Guizhou province upheld its previous ruling — a suspended death sentence — after a retrial on Wednesday that had been handed down to a man who was convicted of killing his wife and son.
The Intermediate People's Court in Liupanshui announced the death sentence with a two-year reprieve to Li Yuqian for the crime of intentional homicide, about two years after the Guizhou High People's Court sent the decade-old case back for a rehearing.
Li pleaded not guilty, saying after the ruling that he would continue to appeal.
In 2001, Li, then director of an iron casting workshop at an iron and steel company in Liupanshui, was accused of killing his wife and son. With the help of his lover, Meng Ruihong, he then mutilated and burned the bodies, according to a report by the ThePaper, a media outlet in Shanghai.
Later that year, Li was sentenced to death for slayings by the Liupanshui court, and Meng was sentenced to eight years in prison for helping him cover up the crime, the report said.
Li appealed to the high court, and in November 2001, it overturned the verdict on the grounds of insufficient evidence and returned the case to the Liupanshui court for retrial, it said.
In December 2003, the Liupanshui court upheld his conviction, but changed the sentence to a suspended death sentence. The high court upheld the ruling in 2004, the report said.
Li still disagreed with the result, so he continued to appeal while serving his prison term, it added.
In September 2020, the high court overturned the verdict and sent the case back to the Liupanshui court again for another retrial.
At the end of 2022, Li completed his sentence and was released. In China, a suspended death sentence will be reduced to life imprisonment if a convict does not commit new crimes during the two-year reprieve. The inmate should serve at least 15 years in prison after that.
On Wednesday, the Liupanshui court said that it created a new panel to rehear the case after receiving the high court's ruling.
"After a review and listening to the opinions of Li, his lawyer and prosecutors, the new panel deemed that Li was convicted of intentional killing and Meng's behavior constituted the crime of covering up the killing," the court added.
Meng's eight-year sentence was also upheld by the court on Wednesday.
