Prison for trafficking 41 babies Choi Chi-yuk Aug 01, 2008 Email to friend | Print a copy
One baby trafficker was sentenced to a suspended death sentence in Shanghai yesterday and another to life in prison for trading 41 babies between 2004 and last year.
Shanghai Railway Transportation Intermediate Court also handed down punishments ranging from 15 years' jail to fines for 23 accomplices, China News Service reported.
It said Lang Chunyan and Shen Yuzhou had bought babies in Yunnan province and sold them in more prosperous Shandong . The pair paid 1,500 yuan (HK$1,713) to 2,500 yuan for a girl and 8,000 to 12,000 yuan for boys. The babies, all less than a year old, were then sold for 6,000 yuan to 23,000 yuan to rich families in Shandong, the report said. In May last year police caught Lang and two of her accomplices smuggling three babies on a train bound for Nanjing in Jiangsu province from Kunming . Police later captured 20 other gang members in Shanghai and Nanjing and rescued 27 babies.
The demand for babies, particularly boys, is strong although many wealthy families now defy the one-child rule, opting to pay the relatively mild financial penalties. Those who cannot have their own children often try to buy babies on the black market.
The CNS report said the police had sent the 27 babies they rescued to an orphanage in Nanjing. The 14 others had either died from disease or gone missing.
