Hubei School Attacker Begged Teacher To Admit His Daughter

This latest report on yesterday’s story of a deadly knife attack at a Hubei school is currently the most-discussed article on Chinese web portal NetEase…

From NetEase:

Hubei Shiyan School Knife Attacker: Had Begged Teachers Four Times to Allow Daughter to Enroll

Yesterday was the first day of school for elementary and middle schools throughout the nation, but a knife attack occurred at the Hubei province Shiyan city Yunxi county Chengguan town Dongfang Primary School. The Yunxi Public Security Bureau [police] has told this China Business News reporter that preliminary investigations have revealed that the suspect Chen Yanfu had barged into the school and wounded nine people with a knife, causing three students and one teacher to die, because the school did not allow his daughter to enroll [did not admit her to the school]. Chen Yanfu committed suicide on the scene by jumping off a building.

Yesterday, Yunxi police chief Wang said during an interview with this China Business News reporter that the initial investigation has revealed that the suspect, Chen Yanfu, was a parent of one of the school’s students, and that because his daughter Chen X did not complete her summer homework assignments, the teacher did not allow her to enroll in time. Chen Yanfu was unable to come to terms with this and hatched notions of retribution. Chief Wang said: “Today was the start of school and enrollment. At Around 10:20am, suspect Chen Yanfu concealed a fruit knife and entered the Dongfang Elementary 5th grade 2nd class classroom as it was distributing learning materials. With the fruit knife, he stabbed the female teacher Liu X as well as eight students. As the police attempted to apprehend him, Chen Yanfu jumped off the fifth floor, dying on the scene.” After the incident, police, teachers, and students immediately took the injured to the county hospital for emergency care, but three of the wounded students (2 boys, 1 girl) died on the way to the hospital.

As of 8:10pm yesterday evening, the seriously injured teacher died despite emergency rescue efforts and emergency rescue efforts were still ongoing for one of the seriously injured students, while the other four students were in stable condition. At present, public security organs are intensifying their investigation of the case. The Yunxi County Party Committee and county government have already established an emergency working group in response to the incident, responsible for work such as organizing medical treatment, investigating the incident, dealing with the aftermath, and maintaining social stability. The Yunxi county police yesterday evening circulated information that according to their investigation, the suspect was Chen Yanfu, male, born 1971 March,

According to “China Internet News” reporter’s incomplete statistics, from 2010 till now, there have been at least 18 bloody school incidents that have happened in the country, with approximately 180 teacher and student casualties at the hands of knife attackers.

Someone from Chen Yanfu’s hometown:

He said he had begged the teacher four times and had almost knelt down [to beg]

As it is understood, suspect Chen Yanfu works in Yunxi county. According to people who knew him well, Chen Yanfu’s daughter normally doesn’t have anyone watching over her, that her academics are indeed poor, and was to graduate from 5th grade to 6th grade in September. After her enrollment was denied, Chen Yanfu had complained to multiple people from his hometown and friends saying he had begged the teacher four times and had nearly knelt before the teacher but the teacher simply would not admit [his daughter]. At the time, some had even urged Chen Yanfu to not get too anxious/worried, and to calmly try talking to the teacher again after school started. According to someone form Chen Yanfu’s hometown, it was clear that his emotional state was very bad, but never thought this kind of tragedy would occur.

Last night, according to Chen Yanfu’s older female cousin, Chen Yanfu and his wife have been working in the South in the past. Three years ago, the couple bought a 7th floor home in Yunxi county Hongguang Community with the money they had saved from work and a lot of money they had borrowed. Not long ago, they were still borrowing money where they could to get the certificate of property ownership. In the first half of this year, Chen Yanfu had broken his right arm while in an accident while riding a motorcycle, and still hasn’t had the metal plate removed. He had been watching his child while he recovered, while his wife had gone to work at a construction site outside the county making meals [for the workers there].

Injured child:

A middle aged man with a knife hacked at whomever he saw

Yesterday afternoon, this China Business News reporter rushed to the Hubei province Shiyuan city Yunxi county Hospital Inpatient Department where the wounded teacher and students had been sent for treatment. On the 10th floor of the Inpatient Department, this China Business News reporter saw that there were police and security guarding the doors to to the rooms with the wounded people, and that apart from parents, no one was allowed contact with the wounded.

This China Business News reporter obtained permission from the parents of one of the wounded students and was escorted into the patient room to learn more details.

Fifth grade student Deng Kun, 13 years old, lay on a patient bed with bandages around his abdomen and leg. Deng Kun says, “Class was about to begin at the time when suddenly a wild man appeared with a knife. We didn’t know what was happening. He first cut me in the belly, and the cut anther boy on his arm.”

Deng Kun says: “The head teacher Chen Changhai who was outside the classroom wrapped his arms around the middle-aged man from behind. Teacher Chen then shouted for everyone to hurry and go downstairs/get outside! That person then used his saw-like knife and hacked or stabbed whoever he saw. Two of our classmates were wounded.”

AS he spoke of this scene, Deng Kun closed his eyes and said it was too frightening, and that he doesn’t dare think about it anymore.

According to Deng Kun’s relative Xu Wencheng, his child is also in this school, but was uninjured. “His uncle’s child was killed in this incident, was 13 years old, a girl.”

Comments from NetEase:

jinrikang100 [网易辽宁省辽阳市手机网友]：

This Hubei Shiyuan tragedy is outrageous. Four times he begged the teacher, why did the teacher make things so difficult for him? It is just as a legal scholar has said, that what is really frightening about this case is in how it may be copied. The media has from its reporting of the very first case been directing the next case. Those who should be arrested have been arrested, those who should be tried have been tried, and those who have committed suicide have done so, but just who exactly is responsible for these incidents?

How can there be a teacher like this? Who gave the teacher the right/power to not admit a student over homework? What was the purpose [of not admitting]? Would making her stand in the corner, go through a class criticism meeting, or making her clean the classroom for a week not have been enough to resolve the issue [as punishment]? Shouldn’t the principal and Education Department also be judged? Schools are for the public, serving the ordinary common people, but instead, they are making it difficult for ordinary common people’s children to go to school. Schools have “school incidents”, hospitals have “hospital incidents“, it’s as if it has already become set in stone that if you don’t cause an incident and don’t kill people, no one will take you [your grievance] seriously and no one will solve your problem. Chinese people’s philosophy of not solving problems until there is absolutely no choice has suffered a harsh wake-up call [in this].

And then there is the start of the school year. How many parents have purchased high-priced homes for their school districts, just for the opportunity for their child to go to school, for their child to go to a good school. How many are renting high-priced apartments for their kids to go to school. To allow their kid to go to a good school, how many spend the previous month looking for connections everywhere, giving gifts and money, paying bribes, with some even having to pay over 10,000 RMB in fees to get their students into schools, doing all sorts of paperwork, in the end all overshadowed by one leader’s phone call.

The ordinary people have nowhere to turn to, no one for support. The suspect had just bought a home and was borrowing money to get the certificate of property ownership. The pressure/stress on him can be imagined. It can be see that he didn’t have money for bribes, no connections to use. If he had a brother-in-law who was a section chief [of a government body], a tuhao as a friend, this incident wouldn’t have ended up the way it did, where the teacher making things more difficult ultimately caused the suspect to fall apart, so that stabbing people has become an inevitability.

This amply shows how worrisome the situation is for those in the lower classes. In this society, those who get a bit of power immediately want to make things difficult for others, ultimately hurting themselves. The unfairness in society will induce even more terrorists and acts of terrorism. As we can see now, what is to be feared is not “black society” [organized crime, gangsters] and terrorists but the ordinary people who, under enormous societal pressures, feel helpless and cannot see any hope. Because they are legion, and they are all around us. Can the pace of building a harmonious society be faster? How many more young lives are needed to urge it forward?

网易广西南宁市手机网友 ip：113.16.*.*

“his daughter Chen X did not complete her summer homework assignments”. Can this be a reason to deny a child from going to school?

网易广东省清远市网友 ip：14.122.*.*

In this age of compulsory education, schools cannot expel or persuade students to drop out for any reason. What right did this teacher have to imperiously forbid the student from being admitted to school? This teacher should bear responsibility for this tragedy happening. Willfully slaughtering innocents because one’s daughter can’t go to school, and not knowing how to communicate and negotiate, these are the faults of the killer’s character/temperament.

网易陕西省西安市手机网友 ip：113.200.*.*

Why is the news content all one-sided?? I don’t want to know how many people died, I just want to know, who fucking has this much power that they can stop a child from enrolling to go to school? Who is responsible for this matter? How will they be held responsible?

人中赤兔cc [网易北京市手机网友]：

Seeing him lying on the ground, I don’t feel the least bit anger towards him, but a sort of sympathy/empathy. His child has forever lost her father, and he will no longer be able to protect his child. Three families have lost their children. This is the sorrow that a deformed society has brought us. Often nowadays, with regards to a lot of things, I feel helpless, whether it be about going to work, school, the hospital, the office or such public government places, I feel I am tiny and insignificant, with no one at all giving me extra attention, much less any dignity. The biggest problem in China today is dignity. For my child, I can put up with it, but not for dignity, and there will come a time when I can no longer put up with it, and ultimate lying there [on the ground] will be tiny and insignificant us…

网易江苏省手机网友 ip：183.207.*.*

First, the teacher [who prevented the daughter from enrolling] should be given an education in honest education professional ethics.

别说我是新人 [网易黑龙江省大庆市网友]：

China’s education [system] is a mess. Is anyone taking responsibility for it?

愤怒的鸟叔 [网易海南省海口市手机网友]：

My prayers for the dead children. Allow me to also say, not a single [family] around us doesn’t send their child to school. I wonder, how many children around the righteous people on NetEase don’t have any schools to attend for their nine years of compulsory education?

删贴也是一种态度 [网易山西省朔州市手机网友]：

Hacking to death innocent children, definitely going to hell.

1750666784 [网易江苏省南京市手机网友]：

There is shit in this teacher’s brain.