China Arrests Suspect in Explosions

The chief suspect in a series of explosions that killed more than 100 people last week was apprehended Friday in southern China, state-run media reported.

Acting on a tip, police nabbed Jin Ruchao in the Guangxi province city of Beihai, the New China News Agency said.

After his arrest at 8:20 a.m. following a highly publicized nationwide manhunt, Jin confessed to having set off four blasts March 16 in Shijiazhuang, about 1,200 miles northeast of Beihai, the news agency reported. He also confessed to killing his former girlfriend in a separate manslaughter case.

The predawn explosions in Shijiazhuang, about 170 miles southwest of Beijing, hit dormitories housing workers in the ailing textile industry. A five-story building was flattened, killing dozens of sleeping residents. Three more blasts ripped through other residential blocks within an hour. Authorities said 108 people died and 38 were injured.

The next day, police identified Jin, 41, as a suspect in the manslaughter case but soon made it clear that they believed he was connected to the blasts. Jin, who is deaf and communicates only by writing, lived in one of the buildings that were damaged and “fled soon after the explosions,” official media said.

His photograph appeared in newspapers and on wanted notices throughout the country, along with the promise of a reward of at least $12,000 for information leading to his capture.

The New China News Agency said police in Guangxi province were tipped off to Jin’s whereabouts Thursday night.

Although some Shijiazhuang residents expressed relief at the arrest, others questioned Jin’s alleged involvement in the blasts, asking how a former factory worker acting alone and presumably without much technical training could have set off four blasts in such a short period.

“I think it’s a fraud,” said a retired teacher who gave her last name as Kong. If Jin were clever enough to have planned the crime, she asked, “how could it have been so easy to catch him?”

Some believe Jin to be a scapegoat. A Hong Kong-based human rights group said he was a ready target for arrest because he had been fired in 1983 from his job at a Shijiazhuang cotton mill on grounds of “hooliganism.”

Shijiazhuang, a city of about 1.2 million, is home to thousands of laid-off workers, deprived of their jobs and the social safety net that China’s state-owned enterprise once guaranteed. Market-oriented reforms have led to painful industrial shutdowns, especially in northeastern China, including Hebei province, of which Shijiazhuang is the capital.

Disgruntled workers were immediately suspected in the explosions.

But other theories laid the blame on organized crime, adherents of the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement or angry residents fed up with corruption.

“People are still talking about what happened,” said a retired millworker. Jin “is not the only bad guy around.”