A WOMAN in southern China's Guangdong Province has been sentenced to three years in jail by a local court for killing her leukemia-stricken daughter and then attempting suicide.
Her probation period is also for three years for the incident that took place in 2011.
Police said the woman, surnamed Chen, was suffering from severe depression amid mounting debts from the medical treatment of her five-year-old daughter who was suffering from leukemia.
Chen was living a smooth life until 2006 when her second daughter was born and diagnosed with leukemia.
The expensive medical treatment brought financial ruin to the family, and with the girl's situation worsening, the mother fell into depression.
On October 21, 2011, Chen took her daughter to a hotel after having some wine at home.
She first choked the little girl to death with quilts and then cut her own wrist with a knife before writing down what was supposed to be her last words. She then made a call to the hotel's service center, asking them to call her husband and bring their son along.
When her husband reached the hotel, the woman had already passed out due to excessive bleeding. She was rushed to the hospital in time and saved.
Chen's husband and parents-in-law begged for forgiveness in the court. Some villagers too, in a letter to the court, appealed for leniency in her sentencing.
The court said it handed a lighter sentence taking into account the woman's mental condition and the fact that the couple have two other children.
In a similar case last July, a mother who poisoned her 13-year-old mentally challenged daughter was sentenced to eight years in jail by a court in Henan Province.
The woman claimed she "had no choice but to kill her daughter" because none of her relatives were willing to share her burden while her husband was frequently out of town and refused to help her.
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