SHANGHAI – The migrant worker charged with the murder of a British Columbia model describes in emotionless detail what happened the night she was killed, in newly released video footage aired by a Shanghai television news show.
Dongfang 110, a twice-weekly news show, broadcast an interview this week with Chen Jun, the 18-year-old migrant worker from Anhui province who is charged with the murder of Diana O’Brien. It was not clear who was interviewing him, but it was almost certainly a police tape and likely a police officer.
On the program, Chen said that, on the night of July 6, he sneaked into the Gin Sen Apartments, looking for money. He made no mention of targeting the 22-year-old model or following her home. Rather, he said he went upstairs and found her door ajar.
“I walked to the sixth floor and heard the sound of a TV. I saw the door to her house was half open. I had a quick look inside and found nobody was there.
“I was planning to take some things from the sitting room, then leave,” Chen said.
Chen grabbed a laptop and was just about to leave when O’Brien emerged from another room and spotted him.
“She saw me taking the laptop and leaving, so she rushed at me and tried to take it back. While I was not noticing, she hit me and knocked me to the floor,” Chen said.
At this point Chen pulled out his foldable knife and stabbed her.
O’Brien survived the first thrust and ran into the hall, yelling for help.
Liu Ziqiang, the lead investigator in the case, told Dongfang 110 that a neighbour heard the woman’s cries but thought it was just a couple arguing on the stairs and didn’t pay attention.
Chen said he thought the neighbours would come out to investigate so he chased O’Brien into the staircase and continued to stab her.
The program showed graphic footage of blood in O’Brien’s apartment, trailing across the hallway and into the stairwell.
The autopsy showed the young model died of stab wounds to her heart and liver.
In the short interview, Chen talks clearly and tonelessly. He looks at the camera, but shows no emotion. He wears a sleeveless orange shirt and shorts in what appear to be some kind of prison garb.
Like all television news shows in China, Dongfang 110 doesn’t air anything the authorities don’t want revealed. It deals with crime investigations and focuses on the work of the police successfully solving crimes and upholding law and order.
The show was given access to the closed-circuit camera footage around O’Brien’s apartment building on the night she was killed. It said the surveillance caught her leaving her apartment only once that night, at 10 p.m., and returning five minutes later.
Chen, however, enters the building twice.
The round-faced suspect said he fled empty-handed after stabbing O’Brien and regretted it. He needed enough money to escape Shanghai and go home to Anhui.
“I had taken a dozen or so kwai (Renminbi worth less than $2), not enough to pay the road toll, so I wanted to go back. To take the laptop and sell it,” he said.
The autopsy showed O’Brien died between 11 p.m. and midnight on Sunday night.
The surveillance footage caught a man, dressed in dark trouser and shirt and white sneakers, enter her building at 11:03 and leave carrying nothing at 11:47.
The same man was picked up by the camera at 03:49, slowly riding a bicycle by the building, obviously checking it out. Minutes later, he returned on foot, carrying only a bottle of water, and entered the building. About 12 minutes later, the camera picked him up leaving the building carrying a small satchel that was later identified as O’Brien’s travelling bag.
When he was arrested four days later in his hometown of Xuancheng city, police said they found O’Brien’s digital camera, two mobile phones, one necklace, two bracelets, three rings and $255 in Canadian currency in Chen’s possession.
They said he had already sold her laptop for about $155 to finance his getaway.
Dongfang 110 aired what was obviously a police video showing the recovered cache and zoomed in on a Canadian $100 bill.
There are at least five million migrant workers in Shanghai. They come to China’s “boom towns” from farms and poor homes in the provinces, looking for good jobs and a chance to be part of the country’s phenomenal growth.
But Chen quickly was disappointed. In early May, he found a serving job in a tea house near O’Brien’s apartment. The owners said he couldn’t deal with the customers so they had to let him go in early June. He said he quit.
“During one month, I needed to buy cigarettes and surf the Internet but I didn’t have enough money. The work was tiring, so I quit.”
By early July, Chen said he was broke and wanted to go back home.
“I didn’t have enough money to pay for transportation so I wanted to steal some money so that I can go home.”
Chen used false ID to work in Shanghai and he boldly went into a police station when he returned home to report his papers lost and ask for a replacement. It was the lead the Shanghai police needed.
They nabbed him one day later.
There is no indication yet when Chen will be sent to trial. A capital case does not automatically result in the death penalty in China, but that is usually what happens when a foreigner is killed here.
Jessie Zhou contributed to this report.
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