Chinese retailer takes blame after six-year-old girl killed by falling shop mirror

A six-year-old girl was crushed to death when a mirror in a clothing shop in central Shanghai fell on her on the weekend, according to Chinese media reports.

The girl, whose name was not released, was shopping with her family in a branch of Hong Kong fashion chain IT in the Xujiahui area on Saturday night when the mirror, which was not fastened to the wall, toppled onto her and caused fatal head injuries, Shanghai TV’s news video site Kankanews.com reported.

The steel-framed mirror, which weighed more than 50kg (110 pounds) and was 3 metres long by a metre wide (10 feet by 3 feet), was propped against the wall outside a fitting room for months, the site quoted shop staff as saying.

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The girl was with her parents and grandmother when the incident happened in the store in Feizhou International Plaza, an outlet mall. Her pregnant mother said she saw the mirror falling but was not able to stop it landing on her daughter.

The girl was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead as a result of brain damage.

“We had regular inspections and hadn’t found it to be unstable … It was a very serious problem for the mirror to suddenly fall,” a manager was quoted as saying. “The company is willing to take all the responsibility.”

Police and work safety authorities are still investigating the case.

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In October, a seven-year-old boy died after a free-standing wooden sculpture fell on him in a shopping mall in Yiwu, Zhejiang province.

The sculpture, made of teak and weighing several tonnes, toppled as the boy tried to climb it.