IN CHINA, A RARE PROTEST IN SUPPORT OF A DEATH ROW INMATE

Protesters staged a rare demonstration outside a Shanghai court in China in support of a jobless man who was appealing against his conviction for murdering six police officers. About a dozen people joined the brief protest at the beginning of the appeal trial for Yang Jia, 28, who was sentenced to death last month for the murders. "We are just ordinary people concerned about Yang Jia's fate. We want to know the truth but they were shutting off all the access," said Liang Yin, one of the protesters. She hid her T-shirt, with a picture of Yang's face printed on it, from police to avoid being taken into custody. Zhai Jian, Yang's court-appointed lawyer at the appeal, said his client's fate would largely depend on a new round of psychiatric assessments, the official Xinhua news agency reported.