Authorities in Huaihua, Central China's Hunan Province, have vowed to launch a thorough investigation into a high profile case involving a dead body dug up from a middle school playground to find out if any officials had acted as the "protective umbrella" for the alleged gang crime.
This is the latest local police have found is linked to gang crimes since local authorities launched a campaign to crack down on gang crimes, the Xinhua News Agency reported Saturday.
Police in Xinhuang county, Huaihua have detained more than 10 suspects related to a dead body buried in the playground of Xinhuang No.1 Middle School 16 years ago, according to media reports.
During the investigation, the lead suspect Du Shaoping confessed to killing local resident Deng Shiping in January 2003 and burying the body in the middle school playground, according to a statement from police on Thursday.
Deng who oversaw the quality of construction projects at the school reportedly disappeared after reporting to local authorities that the construction project at the playground had quality problems in 2003. Du was responsible for the project and the then president of the middle school, surnamed Huang, was a relative of Du, guancha.cn reported.
Local police later dug up the body from the playground. The body was transferred to a superior public security organ for judicial expertise. Whether the body is Deng has yet to be confirmed and the case is still under investigation, according to local police.
Local police have reported progress made in the case to Deng's son, Deng Lanbing, who was cited by China Youth Daily as saying that the family reported Deng's disappearance to local police and they highly doubt that Du is related to Deng's disappearance.
More than 10 people, including Huang are in custody, guancha.cn reported.
Peng Guofu, Huaihua municipal Party secretary, was quoted by thepaper.cn as saying that they would look into the case no matter who was involved.
Police in Huaihua are investigating whether Du has relations with any officials who might have acted as his "protective umbrella," thepaper.cn reported.
Global Times
