Dingzhou residents who lost family in a land row insist on official probe, saying five convicted in court are scapegoats
Residents of Dingzhou, Hebei province, where six villagers were beaten to death last summer over a land dispute, have been taking turns to petition authorities in Beijing for further investigations into the case despite a court verdict last month.
Although a court in Handan city sentenced four people to death and Dingzhou party secretary He Feng to life in prison for their roles in the violent crackdown, the villagers say they are convinced the five are only scapegoats and Beijing must act to bring the real criminals to justice.
'He Feng's sentence is too light. Something is being covered up. We want to find the answer,' said a relative of a 15-year-old beaten to death. 'Otherwise, the souls of the six victims will not be able to rest.'
But speaking in Beijing at the weekend, she said no higher-level courts had been willing to accept their appeal application.
A relative of Niu Tongyin, one of the six killed, said all the relatives of those killed or injured were unhappy with the verdict handed down by the Intermediate People's Court in Handan on February 7.