Beijing Briefs

This guest post was written by Myra Cecere, a freelance journalist living in China.

The story of Yang Jia has solicited a lot of attention online in China. Some see him as a national hero, others as a murderer. On November 26th 2008 he was executed for murdering six Shanghai police officers. His story, and now new accounts of police misconduct involving his mother, while not fully substantiated given the sensitive subject matter, shows a murky side to law and order.

The abridged version of his story is this: in 2007 he was taken in for interrogation by the Shanghai police for riding an unregistered bike, where he was allegedly beaten and verbally abused. In July 2008, while trying to throw Molotov cocktails at the police station, a guard stopped him. He stabbed the guard and then went on to kill police in the station. He was taken away, his trial and subsequent appeal postponed until post-Olympic celebrations. His story has been widely circulated through the Internet - a Twitter account has been made for him - where an active community of bloggers comment about the events that lead to his execution. Less known is his mother, Wang Jingmei’s story. She disappeared for four months shortly after she visited the police station to help with investigation last year. She may have been the only person with details of Yang’s beating in 2007. According to Time China Blog , without her, allegations of police abuse were moot.

Recently, Wang Jingmei’s story has surfaced. In the below link you can read translated sections of her personal account of being taken to a psychiatric hospital by police.

The Story of Yang Jia’s Mother - ChinaGeeks

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Alexandra Stevenson.