Two members of a Chinese doomsday cult were sentenced to death Saturday for the murder of a woman in a McDonald’s restaurant last May, Chinese state media agency Xinhua reported. The two, Zhang Fan and Zhang Lidong, belong to Quannengshen, the Church of Almighty God, were tried for the killing in Shandong Province.
The victim, a 37-year-old woman named Wu Shuoyan, was attacked inside a McDonald’s restaurant after refusing to give her phone number to the group, which was recruiting new members. Zhang Fan and Lyu called her an “evil spirit, ” then Zhang bludgeoned her head with a chair, then jumped on her and trampled her head. Then Zhang Lidong bashed her head with a mop and broke it, then stomped on her face and head.
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Three other cult members, Lyu Yingchun, Zhang Hang and Zhang Qiaolian, were sentenced to life, 10 and seven years in prison respectively, for their role in the failed recruitment effort.
The Church of Almighty God has been banned by China’s Ministry of Public Security since 1995. The group believes that Jesus has been reincarnated as Yang Xiangbin, the wife of the group’s founder, Zhao Weishan. The couple fled to the United States in 2000.
Yang Xiangbin’s most widely distributed book, The Word Appears in the Flesh, proclaims itself to be the Word of God, warning that those who do not accept her words will receive severe punishment when the judgment ends.
