Yunnan police identify grandfather as killer in Zhenxiong family tragedy

Yunnan police have identified a grandfather as being responsible for a family tragedy in Zhenxiong, Yunnan province, which left three dead and four in a critical condition, the Beijing News reported on Friday.

Police said on their official WeChat account on Thursday that Li Minghua, 64, drank pesticide after hitting his wife and five grandchildren, aged 5 to 10, on their heads and setting fire to the family home. His wife and one of the children died. The four other children remain in critical condition, the paper said.

The children’s parents, Li’s three sons and their spouses, work in Fujian and Guangdong provinces, according to the Beijing News.

“It feels like a dream, but tragedy has struck,” said one of the parents on seeing the children lying in the hospital.

Doctors in the Zhenxiong People’s Hospital said the injured children had been unconscious for a long time and that they were not optimistic about their recovery, the paper said.

Zheng Yumeng contributed to this story.