Around 7:00 a.m. on July 18, 2010, while on their way to work, workers in Baoding City, Hebei Province, discovered a decapitated body near a well under a field.
Upon arriving at the scene, the police found the nude body of a female, lacking the head and both breasts, lying on a blood-soaked patch of land. The location where the body was found was a bean field, with no residential houses nearby. The victim had no belongings or distinguishing features for identification.
According to forensic examination results, the victim was approximately 26 years old and died from strangulation. The time of death was estimated to be around 8:00 p.m. on July 17, 2010.
During the search in the well nearby, the police discovered the victim’s head at the bottom. From the shoulders, which showed rust stains and scratches, they speculated that the perpetrator intended to dispose of the body in the well, but it wouldn’t fit through the well’s 29 cm diameter opening, so he dismembered the body instead.
Local police found a young woman reported missing around this time. She was “Sun Nhiem Nhiem”, a waitress at a nearby restaurant, who did not show up for work on the morning of July 18 and could not be contacted.
The restaurant owner stated that the girl had asked for permission to leave around 6:00 p.m. on July 17 and did not return afterward. This timeframe was just two hours before the estimated time of death according to the coroner’s findings. Sun Nhiem Nhiem also closely matched the victim in terms of physique and age.
Comparing the victim’s DNA sample with Sun Nhiem Nhiem’s father’s, the results showed a blood relationship between the two, confirming that the victim was Sun Nhiem Nhiem.
During the autopsy, forensic doctors found no bruises or signs of restraint on Sun Nhiem Nhiem’s body. Combined with evidence of sexual activity prior to death, the police concluded that Sun Nhiem Nhiem and the perpetrator were acquainted. She left the restaurant at 6:00 p.m. to meet him.
Upon reviewing surveillance footage, the investigation team observed Sun Nhiem Nhiem getting into a black car, but due to technological limitations, the image quality was poor, and they couldn’t discern the make and license plate number of the vehicle.
Another lead was a discarded bottle cap found at the crime scene, which yielded DNA belonging to a male individual, but it couldn’t be conclusively linked to the perpetrator. There were also multiple male footprints in the field belonging to the same suspect.
At this point, the police could only rely on blurry and brief surveillance footage to search for suspects. They enlisted the help of dozens of experts, including car manufacturers and auto mechanics, to examine the image of the black car and compare it with other vehicle models.
After much effort, the police confirmed that the car belonged to a first-generation Geely King Kong, which was of considerable value at the time. According to traffic management records, a total of 2,000 individuals in Baoding City owned this model of vehicle.
Lacking advanced facial recognition technology, the police had to investigate each individual, eventually identifying six car owners with no evidence of alibi. Based on the DNA sample found on the bottle cap, they identified a suspect with a matching result. He was Sun Yingming, 36 years old, from Rongcheng District.
Sun Yingming’s family was wealthy due to their funeral service business, and within the village, they owned five small two-story villas. Being the only son in the family, Sun Yingming was greatly pampered and accustomed to having his way. He lived a reclusive life and disliked socializing with others. Even after getting married and having a child, Minh remained solitary and indifferent to those around him.
As soon as Sun Yingming was identified as the murder suspect, the police immediately launched a manhunt, but he had already fled to Fuzhou City, Fujian Province. Sun Yingming disappeared after being spotted at the Fuzhou train station around 5:00 p.m. on September 7, 2010.
The Fuzhou railway police extracted surveillance footage from the station but did not find the suspect. They investigated passengers from Hebei on six trains departing from Fuzhou after 5:00 p.m. that day and concluded that Sun Yingming had fled to Beijing.
On the morning of September 9, as the train passed through Anhui Province, the railway police received a photo and description of the suspect. After checking each passenger, they confirmed that Sun Yingming was on the train and lured him to another car to detain him, seizing a knife from his pocket.
Upon being apprehended, Sun Yingming was highly uncooperative and denied any involvement in the crime. He only confessed when presented with a series of evidence. Knowing he couldn’t escape conviction, Sun Yingming also admitted to another murder that had not been solved.
Sun Yingming said he first committed the crime at the end of May 2010. He raped and murdered a 17-year-old girl from another locality who came to Baoding to work as a laborer. Thinking the girl had seen his appearance, Sun Yingming gouged out his eyes and poured gasoline to burn her body.
After committing the crime, he had plastic surgery to correct some recognizable physical features such as small eyes and a flat nose to avoid being caught by the police.
Sun Nhiem Nhiem is Sun Yingming’s second victim. The two met when Sun Yingming went to the restaurant where Sun Nhiem Nhiem worked to eat and then became lovers.
On July 17, 2010, Sun Yingming drove to the restaurant where Sun Nhiem Nhiem worked, invited her out for some fresh air and had sex in the car. He accidentally strangled his girlfriend when the two argued over some trivial matter. After that, Sun Yingming dragged the victim into a bean field on the side of the road and dismembered the body because he wanted to destroy her identity.
The police determined that Sun Yingming was extremely cold-blooded and cruel in his tactics. After committing the crime, he remained next to the body for 1-2 hours.
In the end, Sun Yingming had to pay the price with a death sentence.
