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Officials, teacher charged over rape ring involving young girls

FIVE officials, a school teacher and a taxi driver will stand trial next week on child rape charges in southwest China's Guizhou Province, the local government confirmed yesterday.

The People's Court of Xishui County is scheduled to hear the case on Wednesday, said court President Yu Deping.

The accused are local vocational school teacher Feng Zhiyang, official Li Shouming in charge of the county migration office, land and resources official Chen Mengran, social security official Huang Yongliang, legal affairs official Chen Cun, legislator Mu Mingzhong and taxi driver Feng Yong.

The suspects are accused of raping teenage girls, all primary and secondary school students in Xishui County, abetted by Yuan Li, a 37-year-old jobless woman, and two of her friends from October 2007 to July 2008, a spokesman for the county committee of political and legislative affairs said.

He said Yuan knew many "influential people" in town because she used to be a prostitute.

"She offered her own apartment as a hospitality venue, helped find clients and took 30 percent of the income - roughly 100 yuan (US$14) per person," he said.

The remaining 70 percent went to her friends, a 14-year-old school dropout surnamed Liu and Liu's boyfriend, 15-year-old Yuan, the spokesman said.

He said the two teenagers, who were drug addicts and needed money desperately, abducted schoolgirls from one primary school and three junior high schools in the county.

Yuan was arrested after the scandal was uncovered last August, but prosecutors did not have enough evidence to charge her with child abduction or forcing prostitution.

"The two teenagers who actually forced the girls into prostitution are underage and have been put in a local juvenile detention center," said prosecutor Ren Bingqiang.

One of the victims, 14-year-old Wang Qing (not her real name), said that she was talked into prostitution by a classmate. Wang dared not tell anyone about her plight out of fear she might be beaten again.

The girl said she cut her wrist once but was saved by her classmates.

She was let go only after she forced a Li Yu (not her real name), a sixth-grader, into prostitution. The scandal was reported to police in August, after Li, 13, accidentally told her grandmother how scared she was at school.

"She said there were always girl hunters outside her school," her grandmother said.



 

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