A mainland man, Xu Shengqi, 43, has been sentenced to three consecutive life terms for murder and nine years for manslaughter in the slayings of a Ta Kwu Lang family of four, on July 5, 2009.

Xu, a decorator, had pleaded not guilty to the slayings of Tam Shing-fai, 43, his wife Helen Tong Yan-yee, 34, and their two daughters, Tam Hiu-man, 10, and Tam Hiu-ying, seven, at their Ping Che home on July 5 last year.

In passing sentence, Justice Derek Pang said, "No pleas of guilt in any of the four cases shows there isn't the slightest inch of remorse for your victims who happen to be your cousins and family," Pang said.

Disheveled and unmoved as the findings of guilt were read out, Xu's defense was that he was provoked by Tam, his cousin, and that he acted in self defense.

Xu stabbed his cousin 79 times. The wife and eldest daughter were bound and gagged while the youngest was captured in a nylon bag. The wife died of suffocation while the daughters were strangled, the court heard.

The bodies of the victims were found buried one on top of another, in a trench 2.4 meters long, 2.4 meters wide and 1.5 meters deep, in the courtyard of the family home in Ping Che Village.

Tam Shing-fai had been employed for 22 years as a clerk in the business office of the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

The two men had quarreled on the Sunday (July 5) when the killings took place, reportedly over a love affair between the accused and Tam's wife.

Police were alerted after Tam failed to arrive for work on the following day. A female colleague telephoned Tam's home and later told police "someone else" had answered.

Meanwhile, a mother of three accused of killing her two youngest in a failed murder suicide bid was found not guilty on two counts of murder, with the jury returning guilty verdicts for two counts of manslaughter due to diminished responsibility.

Lee Fung-yee, 38, was accused of murdering her 12-year-old girl and 13-year-old boy on October 14, 2009 in their Tuen Mun flat. She was the victim trapped in a love triangle topped by an uncaring Chinese herbalist who fathered her three children and claimed to be conduit to the Goddess of Buddha, her lawyer Raymond Yu argued.

The court heard her lover, unmarried Master Lee, had liaisons with other women who had also borne him children, leading her to fear that her offspring would be uncared for by their benefactor, after her eldest was taken away to live with another woman.

Taking the stand, Master Lee admitted his sexual relations with Lee began with a Buddhist purification rite which resembled ritual sex, in an effort to rid her of her negative energies.

Lee will be sentenced December 1 at the High Court before Justice Marie-Claire Beeson.

China Daily

(HK Edition 11/24/2010 page1)