A university in Sichuan province expelled a graduate student from the school for his brutal slaughter of dogs.
Chengdu University of Technology said on Saturday that an online outcry had led the university, along with police, to conduct an investigation that found a postgraduate student at the university, surnamed Zhou, had tortured dogs. The university had strongly criticized the student and expelled him, the announcement said.
On Wednesday, an article published on the internet calling for Zhou's expulsion from the university for torturing, killing, dismembering and eating stray dogs aroused attention online.
The article said Zhou had been posting photos and videos of tortured dogs online for a long time. The photos included those of a dog being fastened to a steel pipe, severed parts of a dog's throat and a stick made of plastic steel.
The caption of the photo of the severed parts of a dog's throat said the throat is very tough and cutting it is a demanding job. The caption of the stick photo says it has a diameter of 3 centimeters, is 60 cm long and is very tough, being able to break a dog's head after only three strikes.
Faced with the pressure of public opinion, Zhou responded on social media, saying he had killed a sick, stray dog on campus that drooled and had a twitching leg, and that had disturbed people with its barking. He added that the killing was a private matter.
Later, he wrote that he was a selfish and cruel person who took extreme measures in order to get a good sleep. He pledged not to hurt any more stray dogs on campus.
On Thursday, the university's publicity department said it had started an investigation and that Zhou had been questioned by police.
Chen Yunlian, a 71-year-old dog lover who has a canine center with some 5,000 abandoned dogs and cats in the suburbs of Chengdu, went to the university on Thursday and found that Zhou had been taken away by police for questioning.
"I tried to help a man who certainly has psychological problems … But I did not have a chance to meet him," she said.
