Woman Falls From Police Building in Hengyang Under Unusual Circumstances

[xtypo_dropcap]A[/xtypo_dropcap] scratchy 27-second video shot with a mobile phone shows a 26-year-old woman falling to her death from the seventh floor of a police building in central China, but the question remains of whether she jumped, or was pushed.

Police from Hengyang City Public Security Bureau, Hunan Province, where the incident happened, claimed that the victim, Su Li, from neighboring Hubei province, committed suicide by jumping off the building at about 4:00 p.m. on Oct. 11. Su’s family disagrees.

The Hangzhou Daily raised questions in an Oct. 15 report: “What happened before Su fell down from the building? If it was suicide, why did she choose the Public Security Bureau office? Why did she cry ‘Dad’ loudly in a terrible voice before falling?”

When the incident happened, Su’s father was working in Beijing. According to witnesses and netizens, Su was at the window for more than 20 minutes before falling.

A Hangzhou Daily reporter interviewed several witnesses. One of the witnesses shot the entire process of Su’s fall with his mobile phone. The video shows that Su was sitting at the corridor window on the seventh floor. Two pairs of underpants fell from the window first, followed shortly by her handbag. Later, she cried “Dad” loudly, in a terrible piercing voice, before plummeting to her death. The video was not clear enough to see how she fell from the building.

Her family said that Su had begun work in Hunan Province after graduating from junior high school, and had worked in an Internet café for years. She was independent and had no previous history of mental illness. She had chatted happily with her sister via the Internet a week prior.

The police did not explain why Su was in the building or why they failed to rescue her during the over 20 minutes she was at the window.

Other cases of deaths in custody under unusual circumstances have been reported by the Chinese media.

Wang Huixia from northern China’s Shaanxi Province was detained at the end of 2009. She died after police questioned her for 20 hours. They said she died of excitement and stress.

Li Qiaoming from Yunnan Province died in a detention center in 2009. The police claimed that he died after hitting his head on a wall while playing hide and seek.

Wang Guochun from Jilin City was detained in 2008. His family was informed six days later that he had died in his sleep from “natural causes.”

Read the original Chinese article.