China executes farmer for carrying out knife rampage at kindergarten that left 12 children injured
- Qin Pengan, 43, stabbed and slashed 12 children at kindergarten in south China
- Attack took place in Pingxiang in January 2017, and he has now been executed
- Said attack was ‘revenge’ for his life had not turning out the way he wanted to
A farmer who attacked 12 children with a kitchen knife at a kindergarten in southern China two years ago has been executed, state media reported Monday.
Qin Pengan, 43, went to the kindergarten in Pingxiang city in south China’s Guangxi province in January 2017, and started slashing and stabbing children.
Chinese media reports that he launched the attack in order to extract ‘revenge’ for his life not turning out the way he had wanted it to.
‘Revenge’: Qin Pengan, 43, said he attacked the children at the the kindergarten because his life had not turned out the way he wanted to, according to Chinese media
Qin injured 12 children, four of them seriously, before a teacher fended off the attack and called for help as he fled the scene.
He later surrendered himself to local authorities.
A local court in Pingxiang sentenced Qin to death, and the sentence was carried out on Friday after being approved by the China’s Supreme People’s Court, the broadcaster said.
Knife attacks targeting schoolchildren are not uncommon in China.
Last October, a knife-wielding woman injured 14 children at a Sichuan province kindergarten.
The attack, which left 12 children injured, took place in Pingxiang city in south China’s Guangxi province in January 2017
In April 2017, a man killed nine middle school students as they were returning home in one of the country’s deadliest knife attacks in recent years.
The suspect in that case, who was later executed, had told police he was exacting revenge because he had been bullied when he attended the school.
Such events have forced authorities to increase security around classrooms.
Violent crime has been on the rise in China in recent decades as the nation’s economy has boomed and the gap between rich and poor has widened rapidly.
Studies have also described a rise in the prevalence of mental disorders, some of them linked to stress as the pace of life becomes faster and support systems wither.