Pilot given 3 years for fatal crash ‘unfairly’ treated, lawyer says
Print Edition
THE lawyer representing an airline pilot who was sentenced to 3 years in prison for his part in a passenger jet crash in 2010 that left 44 people dead has claimed his client was wrongly convicted.
Captain Qi Quanjun, 44, was found guilty of not observing safety rules while trying to land a Henan Airlines flight in dense fog. He was sentenced last Friday at a district court in Yichun, northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, where the tragedy took place.
His co-pilot was killed in the crash, while Qi was among the 52 people injured.
Attorney Zhang Qihuai was quoted by Legal Evening News yesterday as saying that the decision to imprison Qi was based on information contained in a report by the State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS).
Such a document should not have formed the basis for a verdict as it did not include any evidence from prosecutors or the police, he said.
The China Airline Pilots Association said in an open letter it was “deeply disappointed” by the verdict.
It is widely agreed by international civil aviation laws that courts should not rely on such reports to determine punishments for suspects in air accidents, it said.
It further argued that while Qi’s violation of operating rules was the “direct cause” of the accident, chaotic management by the airline was also to blame.
Despite Zhang’s claims, Beijing Youth Daily reported during the opening days of Qi’s trial in November last year that prosecutors presented not just the SAWS report but a range of materials linked to the crash.
The materials were not made public because of their sensitive nature, it said.
Flight VD8387 from Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang, crashed while trying to land at Yichun in dense fog and turbulence on August 24, 2010. It overshot the runway and burst into flames, killing 44 people and injuring 52.
The flight was Qi’s first into Yichun and he was found guilty of trying to land when visibility was below the permitted safety standards.
He was also convicted of failing to evacuate the plane properly and leaving the wreckage without authorization while passengers were still trapped.
After recovering from his injuries Qi was charged and became the first airline pilot in China to be jailed for his role in a major accident. He has already spent two and a half years in detention.
The crash was the worst in the country since a China Eastern Airlines Bombardier CRJ-200LR crashed after taking off from Baotou, Inner Mongolia, on November 21, 2004.
The aircraft, which had not been de-iced, plunged into a park lake killing all 53 people on board and two park employees.
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