18 February 2009 :
a farmer who killed six villagers and injured another was sentenced to death in central China's Hubei province, despite his confirmed mental disorder. Zhang Jinfu, 43, a farmer of Xuyang village in Jingmen City, killed two brothers in their 60s, a couple in their 50s and their elderly mother and a 7-year-old boy in August, 2007, the Jingmen Intermediate People's Court said. He carried out the attacks with a sickle and rice cutter. The 7-year-old boy's mother, Xu Lizhen, was severely injured when she tried to rescue her son, the court said in its first trial. Zhang was captured by police when attempting to flee the scene. The expert testimony by Hubei Provincial People's Hospital said Zhang was schizophrenic.