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First Lawsuit In China Milk Scandal Delayed
From AFP:
China’s first civil lawsuit seeking compensation over last year’s tainted milk scandal has been delayed for further investigation, state-run media reported Wednesday.
A district court in Beijing late last month began hearing a case filed by Ma Xuexin, whose 20-month-old son developed kidney stones after drinking the poisoned milk, the China Daily said.
The case against now-bankrupt dairy producer Sanlu Group and a Beijing supermarket was delayed after the defendants requested further investigation into the link between the child’s illness and the tainted milk, it said.
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- December 9, 2009 3:32 AM
China Executes Two for Tainted Milk Scandal
Two people were executed today for their role in milk contamination scandal which killed at least six children last year. From Reuters:
A total of 21 Sanlu executives and middlemen were tried and sentenced in January by a court in the northern city of Shijiazhuang for their involvement in the case.
The official Xinhua news agency, citing a court statement, said Zhang Yujun was executed “for the crime of endangering public safety by dangerous means,” while Geng Jinping was convicted of producing and selling toxic food.
It said Zhang produced more than 770 tonnes of melamine-laced protein powder, of which he sold more than 600 tonnes, between July 2007 and August 2008.
Geng sold more than 900 tonnes of tainted milk, Xinhua added.
But the woman most widely blamed for the tragedy received a sentence of life in jail.

The BBC interviews people in China for their reactions to the executions:
It’s a chain of responsibility and many mistakes were made along this chain. I think bigger companies should take more responsibility for their actions, and the government should take more responsibility too.
I can’t say this couldn’t happen again. We don’t have a very good social environment and I don’t think it’s been handled very well.
I think the food industry is improving a bit, but there’s still a long way to go. People are more aware of the consequences of damaged food. I do think about those people whose children have suffered.
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- November 24, 2009 10:56 AM
Zhao Lianhai, Advocate for Sanlu Victims, Held
Zhao Lianhai, administrator of the website “Home for the Kidney Stone Babies” created after the melamine controversy in Fall 2008, was recently arrested. Via Global Times:
The founder of the organization “Home for the Kidney Stone Babies,” Zhao Lianhai was arrested in Daxing district by the police on Friday night. Li Xuemei, Zhao’s wife, told the Global times that about a dozen police officers from Daxing District Public Security Bureau and Tuanhe substation presented a warrant for Zhao’s arrest.
When Zhao refused to go with them, as the summons did not clearly state why, the police officers called their superior, who amended the warrant, alleging Zhao was suspected of being involved in the crime of “provoking an incident.”
Officers took away many items, including two computers, a video recorder, a camera, a USB drive, campaign T-shirts and an address book.
The arrest occurred just two hours after Zhao and Wang Gang, the father of a baby stricken by Sanlu’s poisoned milk powder , successfully received an official apology from Haidian police.
Catherine A. Yeung of Under the Jacaranda Tree has translated a petition for his release. Excerpted:
It is understood that Zhao’s arrest is linked to another incident that took place earlier. The trial of the first compensation claim lodged by the parents of a Kidney Stone Baby was supposed to commence on 10 November 2009. Many people, including the parents of some victims, had worked very hard for over a year in preparation for the trial. However, a day before the trial, the plaintiff’s parent Wang Gang was arrested and roughed up by the Police. Information in relation to the court case was confiscated. As a result, the trial had to be postponed.
Because of this, Zhao Lianhai has been busy collecting signatures for a letter of protest. It is ashamed that the Beijing Police will treat such a peaceful act of protest as a provocation. The signatures that Zhao has collected from over 500 netizens are now used as evidence against him. His computers, cameras and campaign T-shirts are all confiscated. Who, in their right minds, could have imposed such cruelty on the children and their parents, who are already victims of the worst man-made disaster? The slogan we once used to advocate for the release of another rights activist (“Your Mum asks you to go home for dinner”) is now changed to: “The 2 kids are calling for their Dad to come home for dinner”.
The Beijing Police had made a serious mistake when they arrested Zhao Lianhai. They are making a bad situation even worse by inflicting more pain on those whose sufferings are already unbearable. So on this bitterly cold winter day we urge all netizens to join us in protest against the detention. We urge you to sign this petition to call for the immediate release of Zhao Lianhai.
Earlier, in March, Ariana Eunjung Cha wrote about Zhao for the Washington Post:
When Zhao Lianhai created a Web site for parents of children hurt or killed by contaminated milk, he did not set out to challenge the Communist Party. He did it because his son was sick. The 3-year-old had been diagnosed with kidney stones and Zhao was scared. He needed advice.
Within days, more than 4,000 families signed up, and soon the discussion evolved from technical questions and answers about medical care to demands for punishment and compensation. It wasn’t long before the 37-year-old former advertising salesman became the de facto spokesman, organizer and lobbyist for thousands of parents across the country whose children had suffered after drinking infant formula or milk that had been illegally doctored with the industrial chemical melamine.
In a country where every leader must be appointed, approved or otherwise sanctioned by the party, the fact that Zhao has been allowed to operate relatively freely is a testament to the government’s careful approach to those he represents. It is perhaps out of respect for their concerns — or fear of them.
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- November 18, 2009 12:14 AM
Grieving Parents Gain Clout In China
Ariana Eunjung Cha reports in the Washington Post:
When Zhao Lianhai created a Web site for parents of children hurt or killed by contaminated milk, he did not set out to challenge the Communist Party. He did it because his son was sick. The 3-year-old had been diagnosed with kidney stones and Zhao was scared. He needed advice.
Within days, more than 4,000 families signed up, and soon the discussion evolved from technical questions and answers about medical care to demands for punishment and compensation. It wasn’t long before the 37-year-old former advertising salesman became the de facto spokesman, organizer and lobbyist for thousands of parents across the country whose children had suffered after drinking infant formula or milk that had been illegally doctored with the industrial chemical melamine.
» Read more
- March 27, 2009 9:16 PM
China Milk Scandal Terms Upheld
BBC has an update on the sentences handed down to those held responsible for the contaminated milk crisis:
State media said a court in Hebei Province rejected the appeal by Tian Wenhua, the former chairwoman of now-defunct Sanlu Group, at the centre of the dairy contamination.
The 66-year-old was the highest-ranking executive charged over the scandal.
According to state media, the court also upheld a death sentence against Zhang Yujun, convicted of producing and selling the tainted milk, and a life sentence against Zhang Yanzhang, who acted as a middle man in supplying the toxic product to dairies.
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- March 26, 2009 10:30 AM
China to Sell Assets of Scandal-Hit Milk Company
According to an Associated Press report, a Chinese court has plans to auction off the assets of Sanlu Group Co., the company at the center of the melamine milk controversy last year.
A Chinese court plans to auction off the assets of the Chinese dairy at the heart of a tainted milk scandal that sickened hundreds of thousands of children and was blamed for killing six, reports said Saturday.
Sanlu Group Co. was declared bankrupt by a court in its north China base of Shijiazhuang on Thursday. Its real estate holdings, buildings and equipment will be auctioned March 4, along with its investment rights and interests in three other dairy companies, newspapers and the official Xinhua News Agency reported.
Fonterra, a New Zealand farmer-owned cooperative that owns 43 percent of Sanlu, has already written off its $139 million investment. Fonterra was responsible for alerting Chinese authorities about the tainted milk scandal last August.
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- February 14, 2009 1:25 PM
China Dairy Boss Appeals Sentence in Milk Scandal
From AP:
A dairy boss is appealing the life sentence she received for involvement in a tainted milk scandal that sickened hundreds of thousands of Chinese children, state media said Sunday.
Tian Wenhua submitted an appeal Sunday to the People’s High Court in Hebei province, saying there was a lack of evidence supporting the charges against her, the official Xinhua News Agency said, citing her lawyer, Liang Zikan.
At her trial in December, Tian pleaded guilty to charges of producing and selling fake or substandard products after infant formula tainted with the industrial chemical melamine was blamed in the deaths of at least six babies and the illnesses of nearly 300,000 others.
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- February 2, 2009 4:22 AM
Death Sentence in Milk Trial
Three men have been sentenced to death for their role in the tainted milk scandal, while Tian Wenhua, former chairwoman of the Sanlu Group, has been given a life sentence. From Caijing:
On the afternoon of January 22, the Intermediate People’s Court in Shijiazhuang announced a death penalty sentence for Zhang Yujun, who sold 600 tons of a mixture containing the industrial chemical melamine to dairy farmers and dealers as a means of boosting protein readings. Zhang’s workshop was allegedly China’s largest source of melamine and earned him 6.8 million yuan.
Also sentenced to death was milk producer Geng Jinping, who had been convicted of producing and selling toxic food to dairy companies.
Gao Junjie, another melamine producer, received a suspended death sentence with two years reprieve.
Besides Tian, another two former deputy general managers of Sanlu, Wang Yuliang and Hang Zhiqi, received 15 years and 8 years in prison, respectively.
See also a report on the sentences from the New York Times.
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- January 22, 2009 10:56 AM
The Sanlu Trial: Diary of a Dairy Disaster
From Caijing Magazine:
A nation’s outrage over poisoned baby formula is focusing on the trial of a former dairy executive who, at first glance, looks anything but a criminal.
Tian Wenhua, 67, took the stand December 31 in a courtroom in Shijiazhuang, in north China’s Hebei Province, for her involvement in the melamine contaminated milk scandal that’s rocked China for months.
Tian is a mother and former veterinarian described by associates as modest and kind. But she may face life in prison after pleading guilty to producing and selling poisonous food while serving as president of Sanlu Group, the most prominent of nearly two dozen dairies linked to the milk that sickened about 300,000 children across China and killed at least six.
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- January 17, 2009 3:27 AM
Parents of Dead Child Accept Compensation After China Tainted Milk Scandal
Xinhua is reporting that some families whose children were killed by contaminated milk have accepted monetary compensation from Sanlu dairy company in exchange for an agreement to give up a lawsuit against the company:
Yi Yongsheng and Jiao Hongfang, villagers in Gangu County of northwestern Gansu Province, confirmed with Xinhua on Friday that they received 200,000 yuan (29,247 U.S. dollars) from the company Wednesday.
Yi declined to give further details on the compensation. He said he was busy and then hung up the phone.
Their five-month-old son died on May 1, 2008 after suffering from kidney failure caused by the contaminated milk. He was believed to be the first child who died after drinking formula containing the industrial chemical, melamine.
By accepting the money from Sanlu, Yi and Jiao gave up their rights to sue the company.
The report says that 3,000 families have accepted the compensation package. Read also an International Herald Tribune report. Other families have rejected offers of compensation in an effort to push for increased research into the health effects of melamine.
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- January 16, 2009 11:32 AM
China’s Dairy Industry Took Deadly Shortcuts to Growth; 60 Arrests in Sanlu Case
The Ministry of Public Security has announced that they made 60 arrests over the contaminated milk scandal in 2008. From AP:
The ministry’s website said Friday 21 of those suspects have been prosecuted in Hebei province, home of Sanlu Group Co., the dairy at the heart of the scandal.
Previously authorities announced 42 arrests.
Tian Wenhua, the former board chairwoman and general manager of Sanlu, and three other top executives have been tried for their role in the milk contamination. Verdicts have not yet been announced.
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times takes a look at how China’s rush to create a dairy industry resulted in mistakes which led to the deadly milk contamination:
Milk is not part of the traditional Chinese diet. Most Chinese adults are lactose-intolerant and many are repelled by the smell of dairy products.
But in the 1990s, economic planners decided that dairy cows were a quick way to improve rural incomes, particularly in northern provinces such as Hebei, Inner Mongolia and Heilongjiang with cool climate, flat terrain and lack of other economic prospects. To encourage consumption, the propaganda machine spread the word that children needed to drink milk to grow as strong and tall as Westerners.
In a landscape that looks more Rust Belt than Dairy Belt, people opened farms in patches of land between derelict factories and villages.
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- January 9, 2009 11:57 AM
Chinese Dairy Firms Say Sorry
From Agencies via Al Jazeera:
A group of Chinese dairy firms have sent text messages to millions of mobile phone users across the country begging for forgiveness over last year’s tainted milk scandal.
The 22 dairy companies, led by the now-bankrupt Sanlu Group, apologised and asked forgiveness over the contamination of products such as baby formula, which killed at least six infants and made at least 290,000 ill.
[...]“We sincerely apologise and we beg your forgiveness.”
“We are deeply sorry for the harm caused to the children and the society,” the text message said.
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- January 2, 2009 11:10 AM
Parents of China Milk Scandal Victims Detained
As Sanlu dairy company executives face trial over the contaminated milk scandal which killed six and sickened thousands of children, parents called for further research into the effects of the chemical melamine, which was found to have been added to the milk. Authorities tried to block a press conference by the parents, and put some in detention. From Reuters:
One of the fathers, whose 13-month-old son suffers from severe kidney stones, said some parents, including himself, were taken to a labour camp on the outskirts of Beijing.
“We are under house arrest now, and they did not give us any reasons why they kept us here,” the father told Reuters by phone.
Five parents had been detained, but the rest of the group held a news conference on Friday, calling attention to the plight of the children. A website created by anti-Sanlu protesters was blocked on Friday. It was not immediately clear why.
AFP reports on the press conference:
“We are not asking for money, as all the money in the world cannot buy my child’s health,” a tearful Jiang said, adding she was just scared of what consequences the chemical was going to have on her daughter 10 years on.
Zhang Li, 26, a mother from the poor southeastern province of Fujian also at the briefing, said her daughter, who was just over one year old, had been hospitalised for a long time.
“My daughter fell ill in June and she was in hospital until August, and she still has kidney stones,” said Zhang.
The parents’ plea came as the official Xinhua news agency reported compensation work for the victims was now underway after the 22 companies had paid money into a fund.
Over the New Year, Sanlu sent out a text message to customers apologizing for the contamination. From BBC:
“We sincerely apologise…and we beg your forgiveness,” read the note from 22 dairy firms, led by the now-bankrupt Sanlu, China’s state news agency said.
[...] “We are deeply sorry for the harm caused to the children and the society,” the text message said. “We sincerely apologise for that and we beg your forgiveness.”
It said a compensation fund had been established for the victims, including the families of thousands of babies still suffering from urinary problems such as kidney stones.
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- January 2, 2009 10:40 AM
In China, Tainted Milk Trial Kept Under Wraps
The Los Angeles Times reports that despite the attention focused on the trial of four Sanlu executives for their role in the tainted milk scandal, authorities in China are tightly controlling access to the courtroom:
China has made a big show of the trial, releasing courtroom video of the defendants being paraded before the judges in yellow-and-black prison garb. But the public has seen only snippets and images, and all but a few carefully screened journalists from government-owned news media have been excluded.
Parents and their lawyers, many of whom traveled from across the country in hopes of seeing the trial, are also personae non gratae at the well- secured courthouse here in Shijiazhuang, about 190 miles south of Beijing.
“There is no transparency in the process. They are behaving like there is something to hide,” said Teng Biao, a Beijing lawyer who has been trying to bring a lawsuit on behalf of 111 parents. “They are completely excluding the victims.”
TVNZ, meanwhile, says that reports that the guilty plea allegedly entered by former chair of Sanlu, Tian Wenhua, may now be in dispute:
Media reported Tien admitted in court testimony on Wednesday that she had known of problems with the company’s products for two months before she told authorities.
Three other executives were reported by the China Daily newspaper to be facing similar charges, and possible execution if convicted.
But dairy giant Fonterra has rejected the reports Tien pleaded guilty to the charges.
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Fonterra chief executive Andrew Ferrier, whose company wrote off its 43% Sanlu shareholding for a loss of $201 million, said on Thursday night he had heard conflicting reports from the trial, The New Zealand Herald reported.
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- January 1, 2009 5:51 PM
China Dairy Manager on Trial for Milk Scandal (Updated with Video)
Four executives from the Sanlu Dairy Company are on trial Wednesday for their role in the contaminated milk scandal that killed and sickened Chinese babies. From AP:
Tian Wenhua, former board chairwoman and general manager of Sanlu Group Co., and three other top executives who also went on trial Wednesday could face the death penalty if convicted.
The high-profile trials and the release of details in a 1.1 billion yuan ($160 million) compensation plan signal that authorities hope to end what was widely seen as a national disgrace, highlighting widespread food safety problems and corporate and official malfeasance.
[...] Seventeen others have gone on trial over past few days with at least four facing the death penalty, Xinhua has said. The defendants included people accused of producing melamine and marketing it to milk producers, as well as milk collectors who mixed the chemical into raw milk sold to major dairies.
A Xinhua report gives a few more details of the trial, including the fact that one of the defendants arrived in a wheel chair after an apparent suicide attempt. Xinhua also says the defendants face a maximum penalty of life in prison, not execution. From their report:
The four defendants were arrested on Sept. 26.
Tian told the court that she learned about the tainted milk complaints from consumers in mid-May, and then the company set up a working team led by her to handle the case.
Sanlu Group submitted a written report about the problematic milk powder to the Shijiazhuang city government on August 2, she said.
Read CDT’s coverage of the tainted milk scandal here.
Update: Tian Wenhua pleaded guilty to the charges against her, according to the New York Times, which has more details about the trial.
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- December 30, 2008 10:06 PM