Senior official held on suspicion of hunting down and murdering mistress in Audi, burning body

By Ryan Kilpatrick, March 23, 2015

Zhao Liping, a retired senior official in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, is currently being held on suspicion of murder.

Zhao, 63, commanded the region's police force from 2005 to 2010 and was also deputy chairman of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region government and deputy chairman of the region's Political Consultative Conference. The victim, a 28-year-old woman surnamed Li, is understood to have been Zhao's mistress.

Zhao Liping

A police source has revealed that Zhao fired at Li twice on the night of March 20 by the northern bridge of national highway 205, after the two spend the night together at the Harbour Century Hotel in Chifeng, just five minutes' drive from where the first shots were fired.

Li, a member of the Mongolian Ongniud banner, did not suffer lethal injuries and fled the scene on foot, calling the police as she tried to flag down a vehicle. Zhao pursued her in a black Audi and killed her at the Lily Garden residential development. After loading her body into his black Audi, Zhao tried burning the corpse and burying it on a nearby hill along with two handguns.

Site where Li's remains were found

After a six-hour carpet search, police found Li's remains on a hill in Xinjing, an ethnic Manchu village some ten kilometers from where she was killed. Police say that Li's corpse "was not burned too seriously, and a gunshot wound to the head is visible."

Reviewing CCTV footage from the surrounding area, Investigators also discovered that Zhao had visited the site earlier, suggested the crime had been premeditated. Along the highway, police also found Li's phone charger, a bloody car cushion, a spade and an ax.

Zhao is believed to have killed Li because she threatened to expose his corruption.

[Image via Sina, Oriental Daily, Tencent]