The Higher People's Court of Yunnan Province has sentenced a man to death for the premeditated murder of a villager who intervened to save his sister-in-law during a revenge attack, overturning an earlier suspended death sentence in a high-profile retrial.
The case dates back to 1996, when Tian Yongming raped his sister-in-law Zhao and then attacked her with a knife after the crime was exposed, for which he was imprisoned. After his release in July 2002, he sought further revenge.
On the evening of November 13, 2002, Tian broke into Zhao's home armed with a knife. Zhao fled, and Tian chased her outside.
A 37-year-old villager named Liu Mingfu stepped in to stop the assault. Tian stabbed Liu repeatedly, killing him on the spot, then caught up with Zhao and stabbed her several times, causing minor injuries.
Tian went into hiding for two decades until his arrest in February 2022. In November 2022, the Yuxi Intermediate People's Court convicted him of intentional homicide and imposed a death sentence with a two-year reprieve. The Yunnan High Court upheld that ruling in October 2025 after Tian appealed.
In a subsequent retrial, the Yunnan High Court ruled that the original sentence was factually correct but legally flawed and excessively lenient.
It cited Tian's extreme malice, refusal to reform after prison, the particularly heinous nature of the crime, his status as a repeat offender, and the severe social harm caused.
The court therefore changed the penalty to immediate death, with lifelong deprivation of political rights, and submitted the verdict to the Supreme People's Court for final approval.
The victim's son, Liu, who was 17 at the time of the killing, described the devastating impact on his family. His father, recognized as a righteous hero at county, city, and provincial levels, was the family's main breadwinner.
After his death, the household fell into debt, his mother later died of cancer, and all three brothers had to drop out of school to work and support themselves.
Liu noted that Zhao gave the family only a small token of thanks—two cans of food and three packs of sugar—shortly after the incident and has had no further contact since.
He filed a civil lawsuit against Zhao in 2022 seeking 1.3 million yuan in compensation, viewing her as the beneficiary of his father's sacrifice. He plans to pursue the claim further once the criminal retrial concludes.
