20 jailed for collapse of quarantine hotel
Print Edition
China jailed 20 people over their roles in the deadly collapse of a quarantine hotel last year in southeast China’s Fujian Province.
Twenty-nine people died and 50 were injured when the Xinjia Hotel in Quanzhou City caved in last March.
At the time, the 66-room hotel was housing dozens of people who had been ordered to quarantine after traveling to COVID-hit regions as part of China’s strict measures to contain the virus.
An official probe later found three floors had been illegally added to the original four-story structure, and safety auditors had collaborated with the hotel’s owner to create false reports about the building.
Hotel proprietor Yang Jinqiang has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for causing a serious accident, forging official documents and offering bribes, a Quanzhou court said in an online statement.
Twelve other people received jail terms between two and a half years and 13 years for similar offenses.
Additionally, seven public officials were handed jail time ranging from two years and over six years for crimes including bribe-taking and dereliction of duty.
Social media users on Tuesday were outraged.
“These ‘tofu-dreg’ projects harmed other people, but ultimately they also harmed those who built them,” wrote one poster on China’s Weibo platform, using a byword for shoddy constructions.
Another said the officials should have received harsher sentences for causing deaths.
More than fifty million people had viewed threads on the topic by late evening yesterday.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
