Gang leader who launched brutal attack on group of women is jailed

2022-09-23

Gang ring-leader who launched brutal attack on group of women after they rejected his advances at barbecue restaurant is sentenced to 24 years in prison after horrific footage sparked outrage in China

WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT
Chen Jizhi led a horrific attack against four women at a Tangshan restaurant
They rejected his advances and he started attacking them in a horrific assault
Two of the women were treated in intensive care over attack which sparked fury

A gang ring-leader who carried out a horrific attack on four women who rejected his advances at a barbecue restaurant in China has been jailed for 24 years.

Chen Jizhi started hitting the women after they spurned his ‘harassment’ in the early hours of June 10 in Tangshan city, east of the capital Beijing.

When the women resisted, Chen and his group of friends attacked them with bottles and chairs, throwing punches and kicking them in the head.

The court said the four women suffered ‘light’ injuries, despite two of them being sent to intensive care and photos showing their faces battered and covered in blood.

The brutal assault sparked fury in China and fuelled a national debate over violence perpetrated against women.

Chen Jizhi started hitting the women after they spurned his ‘harassment’ in the early hours of June 10 in Tangshan city, east of the capital Beijing

CCTV shows Chen entering the restaurant at around 2.40am when he walks towards a woman sharing a meal with friends at a table by the doorway.

He places his hand on her back, and she quickly grabs him by the wrist to push him away.

A few seconds pass and the woman can be heard talking at him, he goes to put his arm around her once more before she pushes him back again – and he responds by striking her in the face.

A scuffle between the two begins – the woman tries to get him away from her by throwing a glass bottle, of what looks like beer, at his head.

Her friend gets up and does the same by smashing another bottle at the side of the attacker’s head.

Chen then turns his attention to the friend, pushing her by the neck. She falls to the ground, only to be kicked, hit and smashed with crockery in the head by his friend, who joins in on the brutal beatings.

He places his hand on her back, and she quickly grabs him by the wrist to push him away. A few seconds pass and the woman can be heard talking at him, he goes to put his arm around her once more before she pushes him back again – and he responds by striking her in the face

The court said the four women suffered ‘light’ injuries, despite two of them being sent to intensive care and photos showing their faces battered and covered in blood

He then turns his attention to the friend, pictured pushing her by the neck. She falls to the ground, only to be kicked, hit and smashed with crockery in the head by the initial perpetrator’s friend, who joins in on the brutal beatings

The footage shows the woman being dragged out of the restaurant as four men continue to savagely assault her.

Once outside, the violence continues, and when another woman steps in only to be punched in the face, knocking her to the floor where she smashes her head on the concrete floor.

A minute later, the men wander away from the scene down a side street behind the restaurant. The woman gets up and runs in a similar direction.

The authorities painted the incident as a gang-related crime, despite calls for a reckoning over violence against women.

Viral online essays slamming the attack as symbolic of the country’s larger problem of gender-based violence were censored.

The footage shows the woman being dragged out of the restaurant as four men continue to savagely assault her. The woman has now faced three minutes of constant blows to the head and body, and when outside, she is smashed into the concrete pavement and pushed into the broken grass

When another woman steps in, she is punched in the face by the perpetrator, knocking her to the floor where she smashes her head on the concrete (pictured in the white t-shirt on the floor, closest to the door)

The court said a police investigation after the attack found that Chen had been the ringleader of a gang that ‘menaced the public’, and that he had committed crimes including opening gambling dens since 2012.

Chen was found guilty of a list of offences, including disorderly behaviour, intentional injury, robbery and ‘gathering a mob to fight’.

He was fined 320,000 yuan in addition to the 24-year prison sentence, and 27 accomplices were given sentences ranging from six months to 11 years.

Their charges included robbery, cybercrime, opening casinos and assaults.

Discussions of feminism have grown in China despite resistance, widespread censorship and patchy legal support for victims of violence.

Women’s rights campaigners say domestic abuse remains pervasive and under-reported in China, while prominent feminists also face regular police harassment and detention.

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