A United States citizen has met his waterloo as a Chinese court had on Thursday upheld the death sentence for him over the murder of his girlfriend while calling the conviction “accurate” and the sentence “appropriate”.
The unfortunate Shadeed Abdulmateen had been found guilty in April of stabbing the 21-year-old woman in the face and neck multiple times when they had met to talk about disagreements in their relationship. He had also appealed against the death sentence handed to him at the time.
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But a higher court in eastern China on Thursday rebuffed Abdulmateen’s appeal, according to an official statement.
The Zhejiang High People’s Court had also revealed that Abdulmateen had threatened the woman after she told him multiple times that she wanted to break up.
On the night of the murder in June 2021 they met near a bus stop in Ningbo, about 150 kilometres (90 miles) south of Shanghai. Abdulmateen turned up with a folding knife and “stabbed Chen’s neck and face multiple times, causing Chen to lose a large volume of blood and die on the spot”.
The court on Thursday said the initial conviction was “accurate, the sentencing was appropriate, and the trial procedure was legal”.
The US embassy in Beijing did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
In another report, no fewer than four people have been confirmed dead and nine others injured following a flash flood which hit southwest China on Saturday, local authorities have revealed.
Footage published by Chinese media showed water rising rapidly in a river on the outskirts of Sichuan province’s Pengzhou city.
Tourists who had been playing in the initially shallow water could be seen running for safety and clambering over rocks as the water rushed towards them, but some were unable to reach the river bank in time.
At least one person, a woman stranded on a boulder in the middle of the river, appeared to lose her footing and was swept away by the current, according to a video posted online by the state-owned Beijing Youth Daily.