Court will review student's jail term for selling birds

A court in Henan province confirmed on Friday that it would review a verdict in which a former college student was sentenced to 10 years in prison for catching and selling endangered falcon chicks.

The case of the 21-year-old student in Henan province captured intense interest on the Internet, where nearly 150,000 netizens had responded to a question on qq.com about whether the sentence was too harsh. About 87 percent of the respondents said "Yes," while only 13 percent said it was justified.

Yan Xiaotian, then a student of Zhengzhou Technical College, found the birds in his home village in Huixian, Henan province, in July 2014. He and a friend used a ladder to reach the 12 falcon chicks. Yan sold 10 to buyers from the province.