The Taxi Driver Hit The School Girl In The Head With A Hammer
More tales about English-language versus Chinese-language news reporting in Hong Kong:
(SCMP) Hammer attack on schoolgirl. By Donald Asprey. November 5, 2006.
A taxi driver was being detained by police overnight after a 16-year-old schoolgirl was attacked with a hammer in Chai Wan yesterday. The victim was walking along Chai Wan Road near the junction with San Ha Street at 8.55am when she came across a parked taxi and a man standing nearby.
She told police he suddenly attacked her, hitting her over the head with a hammer and trying to force her into the boot. "She screamed, which alerted a passerby who shouted at the attacker," a police spokeswoman said. The attacker then pushed her to the ground and fled in the taxi. She said the girl managed to note the number plate and at about 9.30am police found the taxi parked nearby, outside Hing Tsui Court. After questioning, the 37-year-old driver, surnamed Ho, was arrested.
The victim, a Form Four pupil, suffered injuries to her head and cuts to her arm and was taken to Eastern District Hospital, where she was in a stable condition. Police later took the handcuffed driver to a flat at Hei Ming House in Yuk Ming Court, Tseung Kwan O, and left with a box. Then they went to a flat in Man Yat House on the Hing Man Estate, Chai Wan. The principal of the girl's school, CNEC Lau Wing San Secondary School in Chai Wan, visited her in hospital. She said the girl had no enemies.
[in translation]
The story in the Japanese movie The Perfect Education (
禁 室 培 慾) took place in Hong Kong. Early morning yesterday, a taxi driver parked his car near a school in Chai Wan. When a 16-year-old school girl went past, he used an iron hammer to hit her head and attempted to stuff her into the car trunk. Fortunately, pedestrians stopped him. The driver drove off but later came back to the scene. Eyewitnesses recorded the license plate number and told the police. The police were able to intercept the car and arrest the suspect.The arrested "Taxi Maniac" is a 37-year-old man named Ho who claimed to have been driving a tax for 10 years and has a brother who is a police man. The police said that the suspect was despondent and incoherent. The police took the suspect back to two apartment units and removed a box of collected evidence. According to neighbors at the Chai Wan housing estate, Ho lived there with his parents for twenty-five years. Two years ago, his dad passed away and his mother has not been seen recently. Neighbors say that he is a loner who seldom socialize with neighbors. Ho is reportedly divorced.
The schoolgirl is a 16-year-old named Tsang, who is in Form Four at the CNEC Lau Wing San Secondary School. She lives at a housing estate in Sau Kee Wan with her parents and a younger brother. Her mother said that the daughter has three cuts at the back of her head which required 28 stitches. There has already been one brain scan and three X-rays taken. The girl is in stable condition and under observation at the hospital.
Tsang's mother said that her daughter is delicate, pretty and obedient. She does not have a boyfriend and she does not go out at night. She has never met the suspect. Tsang came to Hong Kong several years ago from mainland China. She entered this school in Form 1 and she is a devout Christian. Yesterday was supposed to be a holiday, but she went to school at 9am to attend the training camp run by the church for students.
The incident occurred less than 100 meters away from Tsang's school. A Pakistani security guard at a construction site went to work at 6am. At around 6:30am, he noticed the taxi parked outside. The taxi driver had opened up the car trunk and was wandering around the taxi. The security guard did not think much because many taxis come here during shift changes.
At around 9am, Tsang came around wearing casual clothes and long boots. She was speaking on her mobile telephone. When she walked by the taxi, the driver who seemed to be looking for something in the trunk suddenly charged forward and grabbed Tsang's hair from behind. Then he hit her with the iron hammer wrapped in a newspaper. Then he grabbed her neck and attempted to pick her up and stuff her into the car trunk.
Blood was streaming down Tsang head but she was still conscious and she struggled. At the time, an old man named Au was passing by after having just attended the nearby Taoist temple. When he saw the two struggling, he asked: "What is going on?" Then he approached them. The taxi driver said, "Nothing. This girl fell down the stairs and hurt her head." But Tsang screamed loudly: "Help me! That is not true!" Au was suspicious. Another driver in a Benz also stopped to see what is going on.
The taxi driver realized that his ruse was exposed. So he threw the girl on the ground and zip up the hood on his jacket. He got into the car and sped away. According to the Pakistani security guard, the taxi returned to the scene later and then left again. The eyewitnesses read the license number and then told the police. Au said: "It was a good ting that the girl was smart. Otherwise, she would have been kidnapped."
About twenty minutes later, a police mobile unit vehicle found the taxi about 500 meters away. The police arrested the suspect. In the car trunk, the police recovered an iron hammerhead, a wooden handle, a blood-soaked newspaper, plastic ropes, electric cable wires and a map.
Cultural Footnote:
The above report makes a reference to the movie The Perfection Education (禁 室 培 慾) without any further explanation, because it is assumed that the readers know about it. That is the story about a 43-year-old man kidnapping an 18-year-old high school girl and taking her back to his apartment. He began with a formal apology: "I am sorry for having kidnapped you." Then he proceeded to explain to the 18-year-old girl that he was doing so to seek after the perfect sex that combines spiritual and physical love ...
(The Sun)
[in translation]
A taxi driver like the "Rainy Night Butcher" K.W. Lam set up a kidnapping trap in Chai Wan early yesterday morning. He targeted a passing school girl, and hit her head with an iron hammer from behind. She attempted to stuff her into the car trunk and then take her elsewhere. Neighbors saw what happened and told him to stop. The perpetrator left in his taxi but he had the nerve to come back to the scene later to smirk at the girl. The eyewitnesses recognized and told the police to intercept and finally arrest him.
The 37-year-old suspected named Ho was described as being taciturn and scary. He has been a taxi driver for only one year. He refused to say anything to the police. The police said that he had plotted carefully, so they do not preclude the possibility that he is a pervert who wants to take his victim back to his hideout to rape. Last evening at 8pm, the police took the suspect to two apartments in Tseung Kwan O and Chai Wan to search, and they are also reviewing other cases of missing females to see if there are possible connections.
The victim was a 16-year-old school girl named Tsang who lives with her parents in Sau Kee Wan. She is presently in Form Four at CNEC Lau Wing San Secondary School in Chai Wan. Tsang has two deep wounds on the back of her head that were caused by the iron hammer. She received more than 20 stitches and she is in stable condition. When she took up, she said in fright: "I don't know him. He wanted to kill me with the hammer!" At the time of the incident, she was walking from the Chai Wan MTR station back to the school to attend a church meeting. At the time, she wore a dress and half-length boots. But the short 10 minutes trip almost because a journey of death.
Yesterday morning at around 6am, a taxi cab was parked by the roadside. The taxi driver came out and opened up the hood of the car trunk as if he was cleaning the car. The Pakistani security guard Abdul in a nearby construction site was watching and he observed that the taxi driver was looking around and not exactly cleaning the car for a shift change. So he paid extra attention.
At around 830am, the driver saw Tsang coming from afar and talking on her mobile phone. So he picked her as his target. When she went past the taxi, the driver took out the iron hammer wrapped in a newspaper and hit her in the back of her head twice. Tsang was bleeding from the wounds and also fainted. The driver picked her up and attempted to stuff her into the car trunk. Her upper torso was already in the car trunk. Abdul witnessed the whole scene and charged out to yell, "What are you doing?"
Meanwhile, a senior citizen named Au had just visited the temple and came up too, along with other pedestrians. The taxi driver said: "Someone threw something from high above, and she fell over." Tsang was still continuous and shook her head in denial. The taxi driver got into this car and left the scene. When the police and emergency medical people came, the taxi came back to the scene and the driver drove slowly by and smirked at the girl. Abdul saw him and immediately recorded the license plate number and told the police officers: "That is the taxi!" The police officer immediately called for police patrol to intercept the car.
The mobile police unit encountered the car and after a one-kilometer chase, the taxi stopped and the driver was arrested without resistance. At the time, he was wearing a baseball cap. The police recovered a blood-soaked iron hammer, a wooden handle for a hammer, plastic ropes and electric cables.
