Stabbing at Walmart Shanghai; 3 dead and 15 people injured

CHINA: A man ran amok in a Walmart supermarket in Shanghai on Monday resulting in three people dying and 15 others getting injured.

Police arrested the 37-year-old perpetrator named Lin at the supermarket. The police said that he had come to Shanghai to “vent his anger due to a personal economic dispute.”

The stabbing occurred at a shopping mall in Songjiang, a busy district in south-west Shanghai. It is also a university town.

The 15 people who were hurt were not in critical condition. An eyewitness, Mr Shi who owned a jewelry store at the mall told BBC News that the entire mall was full of firefighters and the special weapons and tactics (SWAT) team were asking people to evacuate at the time.

“I didn’t know what was happening, but suddenly, I saw people running in a panic. No one had ever experienced something like this, and we weren’t mentally prepared for it… This kind of random incident is terrifying and unsettling,” he said.

Meanwhile social media was rife with discussions about the mall stabbing.

A 37-year-old man surnamed Lin went on a knife rampage at a #Walmart in #Shanghai on Monday night, killing 3 people and injuring 15 others. The attack occurred around 9:45pm, just before China’s National Day holiday began

Police said Lin traveled to Shanghai to “vent his anger… pic.twitter.com/0Elam6sciw

— True Crime Updates (@TrueCrimeUpdat) October 2, 2024

Walmart opened for business on Tuesday (following day) but beefed up security. The incident at Walmart is just a day before China’s Golden Week (national day celebrations) when holiday travel is expected to rise.

Last month a Japanese student was stabbed near his school in Shenzhen,southern China. The boy was just 10 years old.

Although firearms are illegal in China, stabbings seem to be on rise.

In June two Japanese nationals were attacked with knives in Suzhou.

Also in June this year, a Chinese man stabbed four university professors from the US. The four of them were from Cornell and teaching at Beihua University. Fortunately they were not critically injured and survived. The stabbing occurred at a public park in the city of Jilin.

The rising incidents of stabbing has given rise to the perception that more needs to be done to help people with mental health issues as many of the criminals are suspected to be having mental illness, based on police reports and statements.

There also appears to be a direct correlation between crime rates and unemployment and financial discontent in the country if discussions on social media are anything to go by.