A FAMILY received a letter from the Shenzhen Intermediate People s Court on Monday ruling in favor of the family whose daughter died in a fall from a balcony six years ago.
The court ordered the contractor of the building to pay the family of the victim, Yang Wenqi, then a 3-year-old girl, a total of 432,729 yuan (US$64,587) for her death in Fuhuaxincun estate in Futian District.
The contractor must bear 70 percent of the responsibility because of flaws in the design of the balcony, the decision said.
The court said the contractor, the Shantou Dahao Construction Co., had not built the balcony according to the standard design. Instead it built a staircase 40 centimeters high and 10 centimeters wide with wide gaps in the safety grille that did not comply with national standards.
The father Yang Xiufeng was in tears after he received the decision from his lawyer Guo Xuanling on Monday.
The marathon case started May 18, 2004, when Yang s wife and her 3-year-old daughter went for a walk that evening.
The toddler ran back home to turn off the TV, while her mother waited outside. The wind blew the door closed. Yang s wife ran downstairs to find someone to open the door, while the girl climbed up on the balcony to call her mother to come back. The child fell through a gap in the safety grille and later died in hospital.
The Luohu District People s Court ruled the company pay compensation of 350,000 yuan.
The company appealed to the intermediate people s court which dismissed the appeal and increased the compensation to 432,729 yuan.
I just hope the tragedy will never be repeated, said Yang. (Han Ximin)
Related cases
There were several instances of children falling to their deaths from buildings in Shenzhen in recent years.
In 2005, a three-year-old boy died in fall from the window in of an apartment building in Luohu District. Two-year-old Li Jiangchang experienced a similar tragedy in Nanshan District in June, 2006.
A three-year-old toddler died in a fall the balcony of his apartment in Xili in July 2007.
A three-year-old baby died when he fell from the top of a building in Guanlan Subdistrict in December 2009.
A 10-year-year-old girl died in a fall from her apartment on the third flooor in Buji, Longgang District in October this year.
A six-year-old girl died in fall from her apartment in Shixia, Futian District on Nov. 2.
(Han Ximin)
