Li Wenlan, a 42-year-old rural woman, annoyed three middle school students when begging from them in a restaurant in Erli Village of the county. After initially lashing out at the woman, the trio, all over 16 years old, subjected her to a merciless and violent beating.

Badly injured Li sought help from a village official, at a local police station and a hospital. They all turned her away. She died after being denied timely medical treatment.

The shocking and tragic case went unreported, covered up by those concerned so that a month passed before the news was leaked to a newspaper in the provincial capital of Xi'an.

Persistent digging by the reporters unearthed the facts of the case, which in turn caught the attention of central government officials, who ordered an inquiry.

The three male students and one of the involved officials are subject to a criminal prosecution while other officials were given various punishment ranging from removal from their posts to being given a formal warning.

The disturbing case raises the perhaps unanswerable question of what was it within our education system and social environment that led to such a rare eruption of brutality on the part of the three young people concerned.

The other question of concern is whether those government employees involved were treated too leniently.

Both call for further study, investigation and debate.

The other disturbing aspect in the whole sorry tale is that a thorough investigation only took place after the press brought the matter into the open and it caught the attention of central government officials.

In this sense, the Shaanxi scenario bears a striking similarity to the tragic death of fashion designer Sun Zhigang, 27, in a holding centre's hospital in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province in March. He was wrongly detained as a sanwu person, under two-decade old administrative code with legal binding which allows the repatriation of vagrants and beggars to their home town.

The central leadership ordered direct intervention in flagrant injustices inflicted on Sun and Li.

Their cases, and many others exposed by the media, beg the question: How could straightforward criminal acts not be properly dealt with until high-ranking government officials stepped in?

Apart from outside supervision, a system within government departments whose function is to hold accountable those who neglect their duties, is urgently called for. Otherwise, the root cause of such tragedies will not be addressed.

(China Daily July 14, 2003)