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Murder charge dropped despite two confessions
By Wang Qingchu |
September 17, 2011, Saturday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
BEIJING procurators have dropped murder charges against two people because despite the pair's confessions they could find neither corpse nor evidence.
Gao Qiuhong, mother of a 14-year-old girl apparently killed by her stepmother and an accomplice, initiated charges against the two in the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court last month.
But the court rejected the case, China.com.cn reported yesterday.
The girl lived with her father, surnamed Liu, stepmother, surnamed Li, and stepbrother after her parents divorced. She disappeared in May 2001 and Gao and Liu reported her missing to the police. Efforts to find her over the years were fruitless.
In April 2009, Gao claimed to police that the girl had been murdered. Police also received information from the stepbrother, surnamed Fan, when he was detained for theft. In a bid for leniency, Fan claimed Li and a man killed the girl.
Fan said Li turned up the TV volume and walked into the girl's room with the man on a night in May 2001. He heard screams. Days later Li warned Fan to say nothing.
Li and the man, surnamed Chong, admitted killing the girl and burying her body in woods.
However, building and other projects have since changed the woods and police failed to find evidence of a body.
Procurators dropped the charges as cause of death could not be determined and there was no other evidence. Li and Chong were released.
Under Chinese law, there are three circumstances in which a private person can press charges - lawsuits such as those for libel, minor crimes that procurators do not pursue, such as bigamy, and cases in which victims have the evidence to prove that defendants violated their rights but procurators and police do not press charges.
Law experts said it was unlikely a court would accept private initiation of a murder case, and police were unlikely to reopen the case without new evidence.
Gao Qiuhong, mother of a 14-year-old girl apparently killed by her stepmother and an accomplice, initiated charges against the two in the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court last month.
But the court rejected the case, China.com.cn reported yesterday.
The girl lived with her father, surnamed Liu, stepmother, surnamed Li, and stepbrother after her parents divorced. She disappeared in May 2001 and Gao and Liu reported her missing to the police. Efforts to find her over the years were fruitless.
In April 2009, Gao claimed to police that the girl had been murdered. Police also received information from the stepbrother, surnamed Fan, when he was detained for theft. In a bid for leniency, Fan claimed Li and a man killed the girl.
Fan said Li turned up the TV volume and walked into the girl's room with the man on a night in May 2001. He heard screams. Days later Li warned Fan to say nothing.
Li and the man, surnamed Chong, admitted killing the girl and burying her body in woods.
However, building and other projects have since changed the woods and police failed to find evidence of a body.
Procurators dropped the charges as cause of death could not be determined and there was no other evidence. Li and Chong were released.
Under Chinese law, there are three circumstances in which a private person can press charges - lawsuits such as those for libel, minor crimes that procurators do not pursue, such as bigamy, and cases in which victims have the evidence to prove that defendants violated their rights but procurators and police do not press charges.
Law experts said it was unlikely a court would accept private initiation of a murder case, and police were unlikely to reopen the case without new evidence.
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