Maoming City, in Guangdong Province, was shocked on Tuesday evening when a 17-year-old student stabbed six of his schoolmates, leaving two of them dead.

Wu Jianguo, a second grade student at the No. 3 Middle School of the city's Dianbai County, assaulted six students with a knife at the school at 8.30 PM.

Two of the victims, all from the second grade, succumbed from their wounds, the first dying on the scene, the second passing away in hospital from loss of blood. The other four were all reported to be stable at the county hospital, although one of them had to have his left kidney removed.

Shortly after local police set a reward of 30,000 yuan (about US$3,750) for Wu's arrest, the teenager turned himself in to the police on Wednesday evening, accompanied by his parents.
 
No reason was put forward by the police or Wu's family explaining his actions but a local villager, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Xinhua that one of the students allegedly tried to hustle Wu for a "protection fee" on the day the incident took place. However, Wu refused to pay, claiming he already paid such a fee. He then turned to his teacher for help but to no avail.

Wu's father, Wu Yunfang, rallied to his son's defense, saying that "my son seldom went out with his schoolmates and he has never invited anyone from his school to our home. My son wouldn't kill people for no reason."

The issue of "protection fees" – which involves students being coerced into paying money to avoid being beaten up – has received widespread coverage in Chinese media in recent years.

The latest high-profile case came to light as recently as March when a 50-member gang of teenagers in Xinyi City, Guizhou Province, was broken up after extorting 16,000 yuan (about US$2,000) in protection fees from over 100 primary and middle school students in the last two years.

(Xinhua News Agency May 17, 2007)