A 12-YEAR-OLD girl reportedly died from an electric shock when she was opening the iron gate of a residential building in Nanshan District on June 19, the Southern Metropolis Daily reported Friday.

The girl, identified as Xiao Yue, lived in a rented apartment with her mother in an old residential building in Nanshan. Her mother, Zhang Xingmei, usually threw the keys to Xiao Yue from the window of their third-floor apartment when she came home from school so that the girl could open the gate on the ground floor.

On June 19, Zhang threw the keys to her daughter as usual and Xiao Yue picked up the keys on the ground floor, but then Zhang waited for a long time and her girl still hadn’t come up the stairs.

When Zhang went to the ground floor, she was surprised to find Xiao Yue lying on the floor, unconscious.

Zhang’s husband, Sun Wenming, rushed home after he heard the news. An ambulance then arrived and brought Xiao Yue to a Xili hospital.

Zhang said she realized that her daughter’s death might have been related to the iron gate on the ground floor because she felt an electric shock when she touched the gate, and an on-site test conducted by other people showed that current was flowing through the gate.

Xiao Yue was diagnosed with electrical injury and multiple organ failure after she was transferred to Shenzhen Children’s Hospital. She passed away at around 4:30 p.m. June 22.

A test report offered to Xiao Yue’s family by the landlord showed that 80 percent of apartments in the building have safety hazards due to faulty electrical installation. The landlord said that all of the tenants should move out of the building soon as required by authorities, as the building’s water supply and electricity will be cut off and the apartments will be renovated.

A Shenzhen lawyer, Tan Zhongxuan, said the landlord should be held legally responsible while the builders and supervisors of the building should also be held accountable for the girl’s death. (Zhang Yang)