Serial killer murdered 13 women in central China
( 2001-08-15 15:44 ) (7 )

A serial killer suspected of knifing to death 13 young women and carrying out up to 70 armed robberies was captured by police in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, state media reported Wednesday.

Duan Guocheng, 28, was arrested at a hotel in the Wuchang district of the city in Hubei province Monday and confessed to a series of murders and robberies, the Beijing Youth Daily said.

Footprints at the scene of four murders carried out in Wuhan between May and June this year matched the shoes in the hotel room where Duan was captured, the paper said.

Duan carried out the four murder-robberies in the middle of the night in dark streets or alleyways of the city and his victims were all unaccompanied young women in their twenties, the paper said.

He was also charged with wounding three other women in knife attacks and carrying out a series of robberies in the city. One woman was hacked to death with up to 38 thrusts of the knife, the paper said.

The suspected murderer was also wanted by Hubei police for the 1999 murders of nine young women and some 50 robberies in the province's Qiuyang region, where Duan was born.

Duan was sent to a juvenile corrections institute for seven years at the age of 13 and was also subsequently sentenced to five years in prison in the mid-1990s for robbery, the paper said.