China executes five for new taxi-hijacking crime

Press, 3 February 1986, Page 13

China executes five for new taxi-hijacking crime

NZPA-AP Peking The hijacking of taxis and murder of drivers, an ugly new crime previously unknown in Maoist China, led to five executions recently in Peking. Five convicted hijackers were paraded publicly at Peking’s exhibition centre, declared guilty of premeditated murder and taken away for immediate execution, the official news media reported. The attacks “have become one of Peking’s outstanding public security problems,” the People’s Daily overseas edition said.

In one hijack, two escaped convicts, Wang Zhenchang and Zhang Hailong, joined an accomplice, He Liange, in hailing a taxi at

Peking's Yongdingmen railway station on July 12, the reports said. The driver took then to Dianqi village on the city’s rural outskirts, where they killed him and drove off in the car. In another case, two former convicts, Li Shulin and Zheng Boquan, hailed a taxi at Peking’s main railway station on November 17 and asked to go to a rural village. They robbed the driver at knifepoint and fought with him for control of the taxi, which hit a tree. The People’s Daily said there were 10 taxi hijackings last year, nine of them in the last six months, compared with only one known case in previous years. The assailants used hammers,

knives, rope, wire and other weapons.

Taxis are a new phenomenon in Peking. Three years ago, it was impossible for even a foreigner with hard currency, let alone a local Chinese, to hail a taxi. Now there are more than 10,000 taxis run by 124 private and State-owned companies, in this city of 9.5 million people. Most cater to tourists and businessmen, but many serve an increasingly affluent Chinese clientele.

Drivers are envied, and sometimes resented, for earnings that are double or triple the Peking average of 1300 yuan ($808) a year — one reason they make likely targets.