Man Sentenced In China Poison Case

The owner of a snack shop was tried and sentenced to death Monday after he confessed to killing 38 people by poisoning a rival's food in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing, a court official said.

Chen Zhengping was sentenced Monday morning after a trial in the Nanjing Intermediate People's Court, according to an official in the criminal court division. Reached by telephone, she confirmed the sentence but would not give her name.

The poisonings Sept. 15 also sickened up to 300 people.

The Web site Chinanews.com reported that, as Chen was taken to court amid heavy security Monday morning, residents lined the road to watch and praised authorities for acting swiftly. More than 20 police vehicles formed a convoy to escort Chen to court, the Web site reported.

After an intensive manhunt, Chen was apprehended Sept. 16 aboard a train in Zhengzhou, a city about 370 miles northwest of Nanjing.

Chen, the owner of a rival snack shop, confessed a day later to spreading the poison, according to the official Xinhua News Agency. He said he was resentful over his rival's success, official media said.

Authorities have tightly controlled information about the poisonings and didn't release a death toll for four days. The Web site of the Communist Party newspaper People's Daily reported shortly after the poisonings that most of the victims were schoolchildren and that two were soldiers from a nearby military installation.

On Monday, the Web site said 42 people had died, but court officials could not be reached to confirm that number.

China has suffered poisoning attacks in the past blamed on business rivalries or people with grudges. In July, a noodle shop owner in southern China was arrested on charges that he poisoned customers at a rival business by putting rat poison in soup sold there, sickening 57 people.

Tests on the Nanjing food identified the substance as a brand of rat poison called Dushuqiang, which has been banned for sale in China since the mid-1990s, according to the Nanjing Agriculture and Forestry Bureau, which said it is still widely available in rural areas from illegal producers.

Death sentences in China are automatically appealed, and executions are typically carried out immediately after the final appeal.