China Executes Man Who Crashed His Car Into A Crowd And Kills 35 People

Residents expressed their condolences at the western gate of Zhuhai Stadium the day after the incident that killed 35 people. (Wikimedia Commons/Didaictor)

JAKARTA - China executed a man who killed 35 people by crashing his car into a crowd at a sports center in November, the country's deadliest publicly known attack in a decade, state media reported on Monday.

Fan Weiqiu, 62, was executed about three weeks after he was sentenced to death by a court in Zhuhai City, where he carried out the attack, quoted by CNN January 20.

Fans crashed his car into a crowd on November 11, in anger caused by his failed marriage and what he saw was an unfair divorce settlement, the court concluded in its ruling.

He crashed his small off-road vehicle at the Zhuhai Sports Center field, hitting dozens of people exercising around the track.

When police tried to intercept his escape, officers found a fan in the car who tried to injure himself with a knife and took him to the hospital, police said in a previous statement.

The court said during the verdict reading, they found "Fans' motifs are very heinous, their crimes are very heinous, their methods are very cruel, and the consequences are very heavy, causing great harm to the public," state media reported at the time.

The death toll from the incident was the highest China has experienced since 2014, when a series of attacks rocked the westernmost region of Xinjiang.

The incident prompted Chinese President Xi Jinping, who described the attack as "very violent," to call for severe punishment, state broadcaster CCTV reported.

It is known, China has been gripped by a spike in episodes of sudden violence targeting community members randomly including children in recent months due to stagnant economic growth, making people who have long been accustomed to the low level of violent crimes and ubiquitous surveillance.

China has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the world, in part due to tight arms control and strong mass surveillance.

The Bamboo Curtain Country Authority has stepped up security measures and called for swift and severe punishments for violators in an effort to prevent future attacks.