Doctor wins appeal after smoking argument led to death

A court in Zhengzhou, Henan province, has overturned a decision ordering a doctor to compensate the family of an elderly man who died after a quarrel over smoking in an elevator.

The doctor, identified only as Yang, was told to pay 15,000 yuan ($2,340) in damages in September after the city's Jinshui district court ruled he should "share the loss" from the death.

Yang got into a heated exchange with the deceased, surnamed Duan, on May 2 in a residential community elevator after he asked the elderly man to stop smoking. Shortly after, Duan suffered a fatal heart attack.