CHINA: CAB DRIVER IN SHANDONG EXECUTED

a 32 year old cab driver was executed for multiple murders, rapes and robberies, according to the Higher People's Court of Shandong Province in eastern China. Bo Lijun, a driver in Dongying City, was convicted of the above crimes in an initial trial by the Dongying Intermediate People's Court, which sentenced him to death in 2007. He appealed to Shandong Province's higher court, which upheld the lower court ruling. According to the court, Bo raped and suffocated a female barber on Oct.23, 2002 in Dongying. Bo murdered a female passenger in a wooded area near Dongying on July 29, 2006, after an attempted rape. In May, October and November 2006, Bo robbed three female passengers of 2,580 yuan (US$344) in total, the court heard. He also raped one of them. The Supreme People's Court upheld his death sentence.