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A MAH-JONG club owner who allegedly drove the car into a crowd to take revenge on his competitors, killing a pedestrian and injuring another, went on trial yesterday.
Sun Liwang, 42, was charged with threatening public safety. No verdict was reached yesterday.
The Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate People's Court heard that in 2005 Sun opened a club for people to play mah-jong and poker in Fengxian District. When another club, run by Wang Liyin and Yuan Xiaoqin, opened nearby last June, his business went into a spiral.
On June 19, 2007, at a lunch with relatives, Sun complained about his business and cursed his competitors.
"I had my elder brother go and threaten the competitors telling not to open again and to smash their club," Sun said in a confession to the police.
After lunch his elder brother went to Wang's mah-jong club and smashed some tables.
Sun's wife called him soon afterward, saying that Wang's son was calling people for help after the attack. Sun became worried about a revenge attack and drove back home.
When he was near home, he saw Yuan's husband throw a hammer at his car. Sun thought a gang of people had been hired to beat him up and destroy his club, he said in his confession.
He then saw a crowd of people across the road from his club and assumed they were Wang's gang coming to assault him.
He accelerated his car and steered it at a man who was waving a stick. The man was actually holding a metal flute. He was seriously injured when hit by the car but the woman behind him was killed.
"I saw a white car driving into the crowd at speed. The driver must have done this deliberately because he turned around and prepared to drive at the crowd again," said Li Peicheng, a witness.
Prosecutors said the crowd were pedestrians waiting to cross the road.
In court yesterday Sun at first denied driving at the crowd deliberately but under questioning admitted his confession to police was the correct version.
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