A CHINESE court has found a man not guilty of the 1996 rape and murder of a woman after a retrial — more than 18 years after he was found guilty and executed.

    The Inner Mongolia Autonomous Regional Higher People’s Court ruled yesterday that Huugjilt, who was 18 at the time of his execution, was innocent of the crimes, and apologized to his weeping parents. Another man had admitted to the crimes in 2005.

    Huugjilt had gone to try to help the victim after hearing someone cry out in a public toilet in Hohhot as he and his friend, Yan Feng, had walked past, according to the court.

    Yan said they had found a woman’s body inside the toilet, and Huugjilt had gone to report the crime to police — despite him urging his friend to stay silent.

    “We learned a heart-breaking lesson in this case; we are sorry,” Zhao Jianping, deputy chief judge of the court, told Huugjilt’s tearful parents.

    He also presented 30,000 yuan (US$4,760) to the parents as an expression of the court’s sympathy.

    Huugjilt was found guilty of raping and murdering the woman in the public toilet in Hohhot on April 9, 1996. He was sentenced to death after being convicted of the crime and executed in June 1996.

    However, an alleged serial rapist and killer, Zhao Zhihong, confessed to police that he had carried out the rape and murder of the woman after being arrested in 2005. But Huugjilt’s retrial was only held in November.

    Miao Li, the lawyer representing Huugjilt, told reporters who packed into the home of Huugjilt’s parents that she would help the family to seek compensation from the government.

    (SD-Agencies)

    In a similar case, Nie Shubin, aged 21, from Hebei Province, was executed in 1995 for the 1994 rape and murder of a woman in the provincial capital of Shijiazhuang.

    Another man, Wang Shujin was caught by police in 2005 for three unconnected rape and murder cases, and confessed to the earlier rape and murder of the woman in Shijiazhuang.

    (SD-Agencies)