The 2011 trial in Shanghai, China of Xiao Zhen (Chinese: 肖真; pinyin: Xiāo Zhēn) for the murder of Hiren Mohini in Mount Eden, New Zealand, is notable as the first time a New Zealand murder has been tried in a foreign court. In the Chinese media, the case was frequently referred to as "New Zealand's first murder case" (新西兰第一命案).
Contents
Crime
Hiren Mohini, a taxi driver born in Mumbai, had picked up a fare in central Auckland and gone to Mt Eden between 1am and 2am on 31 January 2010. In Mt Eden he was fatally stabbed, apparently by a passenger. Police found a knife and soon had a suspect, based partly on CCTV footage. NZ$100,000 was raised from the New Zealand public to support Mohini's family.
The suspect, Xiao Zhen, a 23-year-old kitchen worker at the SkyCity casino complex, left the country, apparently bound for China to visit a sick grandfather on 4 February. China does not have an extradition agreement with New Zealand and in any case does not extradite Chinese citizens even when an extradition treaty does exist.
Trial
After reciprocal visits between the New Zealand and Chinese police, Xiao Zhen was arrested in Shanghai in June 2010. All the New Zealand evidence was translated into Chinese by the New Zealand police for the trial in Shanghai No. 2 Intermediate People's Court at which the suspect confessed. Xiao Zhen claimed that Mohini had verbally insulted him after he boarded the taxi. Xiao demanded that he stop the taxi and refused to pay the fare. A struggle ensued, and Xiao Zhen stabbed the driver with a kitchen knife. The trial lasted only a few hours, with no in-person evidence presented, but Mandarin translations of witness statements and evidence were handed up to the judges. A verdict and sentence was expected on 17 August 2011. On 17 August Xiao Zhen was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Before the commencement of the trial the New Zealand authorities obtained formal written assurances that the death penalty would not be invoked. New Zealand does not have the death penalty for murder.
Associate Professor Bill Hodge of the University of Auckland called the trial "an insult to New Zealand jurisdiction".