Chinese music student, who stabbed a young mother to death after knocking her down with his car in an accident, was sentenced to death

Chinese music student, who stabbed a young mother to death after knocking her down with his car in an accident, was sentenced to death by the Intermediate People's Court of Xi'an, capital of Northwest China's Shaanxi province.

Yao Jiaxin, 21, stabbed the 26-year-old woman six times when he saw her trying to copy down his Chevrolet Cruz’s number plate after he knocked her off her electric scooter at 10:30 p.m. on October 20, 2010.

After the stabbing, Yao drove away from the scene and in his hurry, injured two bystanders. In an interview with police on October 22, he denied he had committed the murder.

However the next day he surrendered himself to police in the company of his parents and admitted to being responsible for the killing, the court said on Friday.

After hitting the victim, Yao did not try to help her but instead resorted to murder to silence her. That split-second decision made his crime heinous and eliminated a possibility that he would receive a lesser punishment, the court added.
In China, criminals who turn themselves in are occasionally granted lesser punishments than those who do not.

“The motive was extremely despicable…the conduct was extremely cruel…and the consequences are extremely serious,” the court judgment said.

Yao, a promising pianist studying at the Xi’an Conservatory of Music, said he had killed the university cafeteria waitress because he feared that she would “badger me and my family endlessly for compensation”.

The Court has ordered Yao to pay nearly 45,498.50 Yuan ($6,983) compensation to his victim’s family.

Police said that Zhang, who was returning home from work at Xi’an’s Northwest University, had only suffered slight injuries, including a small fracture to her left leg, when she was hit by Yao’s car.

The case raised fears that Yao, a privileged college student might use his social status to avoid punishment for the crime against a poor migrant worker who, according to web postings, had saved all her life to provide for her family and two-year-old son.

Last year there was another internet uproar after the son of a local police chief in the northern province of Hebei killed a woman in a hit-and-run accident and boasted that his father’s connections would put him above the law.

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