International

AN unhinged man escaped free from his restraints at a psychiatric hospital in China and killed three women with a single chopstick, according to reports Tuesday.
     The New York Post reports Yang Shitou had first been calmly laying in a bed at Luoning Public Hospital in Henan Province as a nurse cleaned up his room on February 24, according to video footage posted by the The Paper, a state-funded Chinese media site.But when the nurse left briefly to use the rest room a few minutes later, he wriggled free from his arm and leg ties and grabbed a chopstick from a nearby table of food, the local news site reported.
     Yang made a beeline, off camera, to a room full of female patients next door — where he allegedly stabbed four women in the head, according to the site.
     Three of the women died at the scene or soon after.
     The fourth victim survived, according to the Shanghai Daily.
     Yang’s case of schizophrenia had been classified as “critical” by the hospital, which noted he was “an imminent danger to himself and the others,” The Paper reported.The hospital had required one of Yang’s family members stay with him at all times.

But his brother, who was watching him, had left briefly to buy powdered milk, according to the Shanghai Daily.
     Yang was arrested and the case is under investigation.
     This story first appeared in the New York Post and is republished here with permission.