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Chinese death-row prisoner on the run leaves cash at shop after taking alcohol and mooncakes
Police have failed to catch Gao Yulun despite five different tip-offs about his whereabouts, mainland newspaper says as it reports he is a 'dutiful son' but becomes a changed man when he is drunk.
PUBLISHED : Monday, 08 September, 2014, 6:38pm
UPDATED : Monday, 08 September, 2014, 6:38pm
Keira Lu Huang [email protected]
The three escaped prisoners (from left) Wang Damin, Gao Yulun and Li Haiwei. Photo: SCMP Pictures
A death-row inmate still on the run after killing a prison guard and escaping with two other prisoners at Harbin jail last Tuesday, left behind 120 yuan (about HK$150) at a shop after sneaking in at night to take alcohol and mooncakes.
Gao Yulun, 50 – who was awaiting a death sentence – fled with Wang Damin, 35, and Li Haiwei, 29, after strangling the guard and then calmly walking out of the Yanshou county jail, in Heilongjiang province, dressed in police uniforms.
Prison surveillance footage appears to show that Gao strangled the guard. Wang and Li were both recaptured last Wednesday night, near a reservoir close to the jail, mainland media reported.
There have been at least five different tip-offs about Gao’s whereabouts since he escaped. Although police have cordoned off the areas, they have still not managed to catch him.
The Beijing News reported that Gao had sneaked into a small local shop in Yanshou county on Saturday night. He consumed two bottles of liquid and half bottle of beer.
He also left with seven packs of mooncakes, two packets of biscuits, a dozen small bottles of Chinese liquor, baijiu, two packs of cigarettes, a thin quit, and a jacket.
However, Gao left behind payment of 120 yuan on the counter when he fled the scene.
Some villagers who were Gao’s former neighbours told The News that he had always been well organised whenever he took holidays.
He would prepare meals and get the five siblings in his family to meet every holiday so they could celebrate together, they said.
The News also reported that Gao was a dutiful son and had taken care of his 74-year-old mother after his father had died of bladder cancer.
“If they catch him they will execute him, so he won’t need to suffer any more,” his mother told the newspaper.
Last December Gao killed his childhood friend, Li Deyue, after an argument.
Fellow villagers told the newspaper that Gao had “liked to drink, and once he was drunk he turned in another person”.
The News also reported that Li had also cared for his own family.
He had been caught after escaping from prison when only 10 kilometres away from home, the newspaper said.
He told police later that the only thing he had wanted to do was simply to see his son again.
On the day of his escape, he had paid five yuan for a cigarette lighter, a carton of milk and two sugar-coated pancakes. He had spent the night hiding on a hillside, The News reported.
Li had stabbed to death a man who was the co-worker of his former wife last October, after suspecting him of having a relationship with her, the newspaper reported.
He had been arrested in March and his father had tried – but failed – to convince the authorities that he suffered from a mental disease, because there was a history of mental disease in the family, The News said.
Wang had spent half his life in prison and had been jailed five times – including his return to prison after his recapture last week, the newspaper reported.
He had stolen a motorcycle aged 18, and jailed for the first time for a year.
His brother told The News that Wang had always been asking for money and had told many lies.
The newspaper reported Wang had sent a group of former convicts to a house to scare the occupants to pay back money owed to his uncle, but a woman at the house had died of a heart attack after becoming frightened.
After Wang was caught last week, he admitted that, while on the run, he had stolen and eaten fruit that families had left on the graves of ancestors.
