SHANGHAI: A trial that has it all has opened in Shanghai, featuring sex, murder, lies and an international escape attempt.

Chinese graduate student Chen Danlei stands accused at Shanghai No 1 Intermediate People's court of murdering and dismembering her husband He Lei on August 20, while the couple were living in the United States.

Chen admitted to shooting her husband, but denied that it was she who had cut his body into eight parts. Instead she blamed it on a mysterious third party.

"When I saw blood gush out of his head, I tried to stop it by covering it with clothes, but I could not," Chen told the court.

"I held his head and burst into tears."

Chen said she could not remember how long she was in the room until she began to notice the strong odour of the body.

"I wanted to put him into the refrigerator, but he was too heavy to move," Chen said.

"I then turned on my computer and contacted a man named Jack who I had been talking online to for some time," Chen said.

"I told him the trouble I was in, and he said he would help me if I paid. We agreed on US$2,000."

Chen said she requested Jack to move the body, not cut it.

"He asked me to leave the room for a while. I did and found He Lei in the refrigerator in pieces when I came back several hours later. Jack had left by then."

However, a supermarket receipt was later found by US police at their apartment on Fifth Street in Lafayette, Indiana, showing Chen had shopped after the murder. The products included refuse bags, gloves, and deodorant. Pressed on this evidence, Chen claimed Jack had told her to buy these things.

Inspection of Chen's desktop computer and her laptop failed to find records of conversations with anyone named Jack.

Chen moved the body parts into the couple's car, which she drove in the direction of Chicago and abandoned in a parking garage of a hotel. She booked a room in the hotel under her name, but purchased a plane ticket to Shanghai under He's name.

Saying she was 'paying a visit to her mother's tomb' in Chengdu, her hometown, Chen took a flight to Shanghai on August 26. She was arrested after customs officials discovered she was using He's passport but had replaced the photo.

Customs officials then searched her belongings, finding random notes saying "have to finish dealing the body," and "purchase air ticket with his credit card,"

Chen then confessed to the murder and was transferred to Shanghai Municipal Public Security Bureau one day later.

On August 30, US police found the body parts, wrapped in refuse bags, after a local resident complained of the stench.

China sent a team to the United States in November, to collect evidence and conduct further investigation.

The couple were classmates at prestigious Tsinghua University, and they got married in 2001 when they moved to the United States for further study at Purdue University.

"I love him very much but he wanted to divorce me as we quarrelled a lot," she said.

"My mother lived a miserable life after my father divorced her, and I don't want to follow her," she said.

On December 25, 2004, Chen stabbed He, with Shanghai media speculating that the attack occurred while the couple were having sex. He hired a lawyer to defend his wife, and bailed her out for US$50,000.

After the attack, the local court placed a restraining order on Chen, saying she could not approach unless for therapy. They lived together several months later at the suggestion of their therapist.

"I thought he had forgiven me, but he mentioned divorce again," she said. Chen started looking into online gun purchase in early August, 2005. Records of search and discussion were found in her computers.

She made the purchase on August 18, 2005, using the name Jack Washington. The seller provided an affidavit to the court.

"I wanted to kill him and then myself," she said.

They had a serious spat again in the evening of August 19, 2005.

"I woke him up the next morning and begged him not to divorce me, but he disagreed," she said. Chen then shot him in the head.

The trial has now been adjourned and no dates have been given for resumption. Diagnosis by Shanghai Ankang Hospital found Chen to be mentally sound.

(China Daily 07/11/2006 page3)