THE former head of a Shenzhen education institution, who was found guilty of raping an employee last May, has lodged an appeal against his conviction and four-year jail sentence.
Song Shanmu, 46, founder and former president of the Sunmoon Education Group, claims his conviction was based only on the words of the victim, identified as Luo Yun, yesterday s Shenzhen Evening News reported.
Song was also seeking to have a supplementary civil judgment set aside, Song s lawyer Gan Yongming said.
Song was sentenced in December by the Luohu District People s Court to four years in prison for raping Luo and ordered to pay her 4,205 yuan (US$635) in compensation.
Gan claimed Luo had willingly agreed to sex for money.
The main evidence for the ruling was based on Luo s words and key words such as forced, violence, against a woman s will were all against the facts. For example, the judge thought Luo was forced to have sex with Song because she was upset after the sex and threw her underwear, but I did not think that this evidence should stand. It was quite unfair to make the ruling based only on one woman s words, Gan said.
Luo called police eight hours later, saying Song forced her to have sex with him at his apartment and took pictures of her in the nude, but police investigation did not find any evidence to support her claim, Gan said.
Meanwhile, bank receipts showed she later withdrew 3,000 yuan, so it was possible she had sex with Song for money, Gan said.
Luo has said the 3,000 yuan was compensation for her service at the training center after she decided to quit her job.
(Wang Yuanyuan)
