Jiangxi teacher jailed for 14 years for molesting seven pupils
Seven pupils were molested in a Jiangxi school and most got a sexual disease
A teacher who molested seven girls in Jiangxi province and passed along a sexually transmitted disease has been jailed for 14 years, state media reported yesterday.
Tao Biaogong, 62, was sentenced by the Ruichang People's Court after being found guilty of molesting the second-grade pupils on several occasions between September last year and May this year, the court said on its website on Friday. The sexual assaults led six of the girls to contract the human papillomavirus, the statement said.
"A 14-year-sentence is reasonable and suitable for Tao's offence as the maximum penalty for molesting children on the mainland is 15 years," Wang Yu , a Beijing lawyer retained by three of the victims' parents, told the Sunday Morning Post.
"But for the parents of the seven victims, of course, they thought a 14-year-sentence was too light as some even felt Tao deserved the death penalty."
Tao was also deprived of his political rights for four years, the verdict said, adding the severity of the sentence reflected the physical harm and mental health injury he had caused to the girls.
Tao was detained on July 5 after the girls' parents reported the case to the police. The girls are aged from eight to nine, and most are "left-behind children", or those whose parents work as migrant labourers outside their hometown.