Chinese University Student Poisoned to Death by Roommate

On Sina Weibo:

#Fudan University Poisoning#

Fudan University graduate student suspected of being poisoned by roommate in critical condition

April 1st, a Fudan University class of 2010 [year of entry] medical graduate student was feeling unwell and was taken to a hospital affiliated with the school to see a doctor. After being hospitalized, his condition worsened, losing consciousness and suffering liver failure. The hospital conducted multiple consultations and diagnoses but has not yet found the cause. Police investigating the remaining water in this student’s dorm water dispenser detected traces of a poisonous chemical compound, essentially determining that a roommate and fellow student is the suspect.

This hashtag has over 56m discussions.

From Sina Weibo:

@央视新闻 [CCTV News]: Huang Yang, tonight we bid you farewell : He was from Rong county of Sichuan province, who in 2005 was admitted to Fudan University with a [gaokao college entrance examination] score of 690 points. Both parents are retired workers, and his family financial situation is difficult. All of his university expenses were paid with money he earned himself, never having once used his family’s money. He optimistically sought to improve himself. The medical expenses for his mother’s liver surgery also came from money from his scholarships, hard-work, and scrimping on expenses. Today, a 28-year-old young life has come to a sudden stop! Tonight, we’ll light candles, and send you off!

This microblog post currently has nearly 2m reshares with over 65k comments spanning 3200 pages, making it one of the top posts on the Sina Weibo social network. Most of the comments left by Chinese netizens were candles and condolences.

From Sina Weibo:

@复旦大学 [Fudan University Official Microblog Account]: We report with great sorrow that class of 2010 master’s degree graduate student Huang Yang died at 3:23pm on April 16th at Zhongshan Hospital of Fudan University after efforts to resuscitate him failed. During Huang Yang’s stay at the hospital, the hospital expended all efforts and multiple consultations to save him, and we did our best to save our own student. For parents to lose a beloved son and a school to lose a valuable student, we express deep grief!

This microblog post was reshared over 163k times and 62k comments over 3100 pages. Again, most of the netizen comments were candles.

From Sina Weibo:

@李佳佳Audrey: Victim and friend Fudan student’s latest update: When I went to see him on Friday, he had already become completely unrecognizable, his entire body swollen, his breathing tube full of bloody bubbles. In just a short week, he’s gone. What is even more unexpected is that he had been poisoned by someone. The poisoner is his good friend and roommate, who had put 10x the dosage of an experimental chemical compound in the water dispenser, leading to his good friend in just a few days suffering liver failure, emphysema, then brain death.

On Sina Weibo:

#Fudan University Poisoning Case#

Fudan poisoning case cracked by mysterious text message, suspect’s microblog exposed

April 16th, Fudan University poisoning victim Huang Yang @yunghuang died, the toxin being N-Nitrosodimethylamine. On the 9th day after Huang Yang fell ill, he received a mysterious text message reminding him of a certain chemical drug, which proved to be a major break in the case, leading to suspect Lin Senhao @大汉漠北. It’s said that Huang Yang was killed by mistake. May fellow student Huang Yang rest in peace, and the murderer be severely punished!

This hashtag currently has over 372k discussions. “Huang Yang” is currently also the most searched keyword on Sina Weibo, yielding 1.4m results.

On Sina Weiba:

And so the truth slowly surfaced

The story likely goes like this: Poisoning suspect Lin Senhao’s real intention was not to poison Huang Yang, but rather another roommate Jiang Cheng. He had previously in 2012 registered an account on Baidu named “诛姜成”, where he asked a lot about toxic/poisonous chemical compounds, his intention also likely not being to directly poison [Jiang Cheng] to death, but to use small dosages to slowly poison him and eventually kill him, only to unexpectedly use the wrong dosage and mistakenly kill Huang Yang, ultimately causing a tragedy.

Lin Senhao felt guilty, and when experts were unable to diagnose the illness, he used his mobile phone to send a text message to Huang Yang, telling him the poison’s chemical compound, so that Huang Yang could be saved. However, it was precisely because of this text message that a suspect was arrested.

The Fudan University Poisoning case reminded Chinese netizens of a previous case, resulting in the following hashtag also trending…

On Sina Weibo:

#Tsinghua University Poisoning Case#

Tsinghua female student mysteriously poisoned, what happened remains unknown to this day

1994, Tsinghua University class of 1992 Chemistry major Zhu Ling exhibited symptoms of thallium poisoning, resulting in full body paralysis, 100% permanent disability, and brain damage. Zhu Ling’s parents believed she was “intentionally poisoned” by her roommate, with the case going on over 10 years now without being solved.

This case was also mentioned in a chinaSMACK report over two years ago, of a former Peking University chemist who poisoned her Tsinghua University graduate husband in America.