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Girl, 2, dies after man dashed her to ground in row with mom

THE two-year-old girl who was thrown to the ground by a man after a quarrel with her mother Tuesday evening in Beijing has died, local media reported today.

Two days of treatment failed to save her life -- she was pronounced dead by doctors late yesterday evening.

Her body has been transferred to the hospital mortuary, a heartbreaking ending for tens of thousands of people across the country who had been praying for her since learning about the story.

The 42-year-old man, surnamed Han, who pulled the girl from a stroller and dashed her to the ground, has been arrested.

He had served time for larceny and was just released earlier this year.

The tragedy occurred about 8:50pm on Tuesday.

Video footage from surveillance cameras showed the girl sleeping soundly in a stroller. The mother is seen in the footage bending over to check on her daughter when a white sedan stopped close to them, with the suspect, surnamed Han, and a driver, Legal Evening News reported yesterday.

"It looked like they asked the woman to move as they wanted to park their car there," a manager of a nearby restaurant told the newspaper.

But the women refused, which seemed to infuriate Han.

In the next few minutes, Han, a Beijing native, struck the woman and then picked the baby from the stroller, lifted her above his head and dashed her to the ground. The driver, too, came out of the car and slapped the woman, the restaurant manager said.

The baby girl did not cry or move, the manager added..

The two men then drove off, leaving the woman crying in despair. With the help of passersby, she rushed the baby to the nearby Jiugong Hospital, Beijing Times reported. The girl was later transferred to Tiantan Hospital for further treatment.

"Can you hear mom? Please recover quickly," the mother kept murmuring from outside the ICU.

Police traced the white sedan at a residential complex on Wednesday. Han was detained at a thermal spring club the same afternoon. The driver, surnamed Li, surrendered yesterday.

Law expert Hong Daode said Han had lost all "sense of humanity" and can be charged with intentional homicide.

Netizens expressed their anguish over the incident but some seemed to suggest that the mother should also take some of the blame.

"You can't get into arguments with others while carrying your baby with you. Enduring doesn't mean you are a coward. Nothing is more important than the child's safety," a poster commented yesterday.



 

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