Mom on trial for killing son

By Xu Fang  |   2008-11-18  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

SHAN Rongxia, a mother charged with fatally abusing her 4-year-old son because he wet his bed, went on trial in Shanghai yesterday.

Her husband, Qi Jianhua, was also in Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate People's Court for allegedly helping his wife dispose of the corpse of their child.

Prosecutors recommended a sentence ranging from 10 years to death for Shan, 25, an Anhui Province native, who was charged with assault. The maximum sentence for Qi, a 29-year-old Shandong Province native, is three years for helping to destroy evidence.

In spite of being accused of killing her son, Shan didn't show much sorrow at the hearing, which did not end in an immediate verdict. She admitted she kicked the boy in the back, but she said she killed him by mistake because he urinated in his bed.

On the morning of May 29, the boy, identified as Le Le, urinated on the bed and Shan forced him to kneel on the ground for hours without anything to eat, prosecutors said.

During the period, Shan kicked the boy in the back because he urinated again, and when the child defecated in his clothes, she kicked him again in the back and in the abdomen, prosecutors said.

Late that evening, Shan discovered the boy was not breathing. She called Qi, and he suggested they take the boy to a hospital. But Shan refused, saying he was already dead, according to testimony.

Shan put her son's body into a bag and asked Qi to help her throw it away. They went to a remote area on Yuanjiang Road and disposed of the body, according to prosecutors.

The boy's remains were found by two men who were fishing on June 1.

The medical examiner said the boy died from a ruptured liver. Doctors also discovered his back and limbs were full of scars and wounds.

Qi and neighbors said Shan often abused the boy.