Published by: THE WORLD UYGHUR NETWORK NEWS, May 9, 1997

Urumqi Xinjiang Television Network, 05/03/97

The intermediary court of the Urumqi railroad transportation bureau

held a public meeting this morning at the south station to hand down

sentences on six criminal elements who seriously disrupted public

security and order in railroad transportation.

[Video shows security officers leading the six criminals to a public

square adjoining the railroad station with a large crowd and the

criminals standing in a row when the sentences are read to them]

A six-member criminal gang consisting of (Huang Junqi) and (Gao Dewen),

the leaders, and (Han Chenghu), (Han Dehai), (Liu Shengdi), and (Xu

Wei), under the pretense of purchasing train tickets for passengers, on

two separate occasions deceived and forced 41 passengers into paying

450 yuan for tickets of ordinary-class seats for short trips at a hotel

near the Urumqi railway station. When the passengers refused, they

beat them up with sticks and slashed them with knives before robbing

more than 13,000 yuan in cash off them.

The Urumqi railroad intermediary court, in accordance with the PRC

Criminal Law, convicted the six criminals of robbery. The court

sentenced principal culprits (Huang Junqi) and (Gao Dewen) to death and

stripped them of their political rights for life; (Han Chenghu) was

sentenced to life imprisonment; and the remaining three criminals were

sentenced to 15 or 16 years fixed-term imprisonment.