Cleaver killer 'ill, unbalanced'
Source: Agencies/Shanghai Daily |
May 14, 2010, Friday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
A MAN who hacked to death seven kindergarten students as young as 3 argued with the school's manager over the property's lease, neighbors said yesterday, offering a possible motive behind the latest in a string of bloody rampages in China's schools.
The school's manager and her elderly mother were also killed in the attack in Hanzhong in northwestern Shaanxi Province on Wednesday, which left 11 other children hospitalized.
It was the deadliest of five such assaults on schools in less than two months and occurred despite heightened security countrywide, with gates and cameras installed at some schools and additional police and guards posted at entrances.
Yesterday police cordoned off the private Shengshui Temple Kindergarten, a two-story building on the rural outskirts of Hanzhong.
The attacker who charged into the kindergarten with a cleaver was a familiar figure to local villagers, according to doctors and residents.
The killer, Wu Huanming, 48, committed suicide at home following the attack.
Villagers said Wu Huanming leased his house to teacher and school administrator Wu Hongying for the kindergarten, but there was a dispute over the rent.
Police told a press conference yesterday that the attacker suffered numerous ailments, including diabetes, and had attempted suicide at least twice in the past month.
They also said the man had a fixation with reptiles and was incensed that the school manager had killed a snake.
Villagers watched on Wednesday as an argument erupted between the attacker and Wu Hongying, 50.
The attacker ran back into his home to grab the cleaver and onlookers were too afraid to stop him, a villager said.
He hacked five boys and two girls to death with the cleaver, plus the two adults.
"He'd been ill, he had been talking nonsense ... like he was unbalanced," a relative, Wu Huangcheng, 58, told Reuters.
Six of the most badly wounded children, four boys and two girls between the ages of 3 and 6-1/2, were being treated at the 3201 Hospital in Hanzhong and were in stable conditions, said Zhao Fangling, the vice director of the hospital. The other five are being treated at a separate hospital.
"We've never seen anything like this before ... never," Zhao said.
The school's manager and her elderly mother were also killed in the attack in Hanzhong in northwestern Shaanxi Province on Wednesday, which left 11 other children hospitalized.
It was the deadliest of five such assaults on schools in less than two months and occurred despite heightened security countrywide, with gates and cameras installed at some schools and additional police and guards posted at entrances.
Yesterday police cordoned off the private Shengshui Temple Kindergarten, a two-story building on the rural outskirts of Hanzhong.
The attacker who charged into the kindergarten with a cleaver was a familiar figure to local villagers, according to doctors and residents.
The killer, Wu Huanming, 48, committed suicide at home following the attack.
Villagers said Wu Huanming leased his house to teacher and school administrator Wu Hongying for the kindergarten, but there was a dispute over the rent.
Police told a press conference yesterday that the attacker suffered numerous ailments, including diabetes, and had attempted suicide at least twice in the past month.
They also said the man had a fixation with reptiles and was incensed that the school manager had killed a snake.
Villagers watched on Wednesday as an argument erupted between the attacker and Wu Hongying, 50.
The attacker ran back into his home to grab the cleaver and onlookers were too afraid to stop him, a villager said.
He hacked five boys and two girls to death with the cleaver, plus the two adults.
"He'd been ill, he had been talking nonsense ... like he was unbalanced," a relative, Wu Huangcheng, 58, told Reuters.
Six of the most badly wounded children, four boys and two girls between the ages of 3 and 6-1/2, were being treated at the 3201 Hospital in Hanzhong and were in stable conditions, said Zhao Fangling, the vice director of the hospital. The other five are being treated at a separate hospital.
"We've never seen anything like this before ... never," Zhao said.
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