In China, video of deadly accident reignites debate over lack of trust

BEIJING — An agonizing traffic accident caught on surveillance cameras has reignited a debate in China about a lack of values and trust in society.

The incident took place April 21 in Zhumadian, a city in the central province of Henan. The graphic video, which was posted online Wednesday, shows a woman trying to cross a street on a crosswalk during what appears to be a red light for pedestrians.

After crossing two lanes, she is struck by a taxi and tossed in the air before landing on the ground. Then the light turns green for pedestrians. People walk by but do not help, nor do the drivers who were stopped at the light. The woman lifts her head, but the traffic resumes and she is soon run over by an SUV. She later died from her injuries.

“If this case was only about the first driver running away after hitting the victim, it would just be a normal traffic accident,” said Zhang Xuebing, a lawyer and a former law professor at the East China University of Political Science and Law in Shanghai. “But the reason it’s stirred up a heated discussion is because many onlookers on site didn’t help the victim.”

The original video has been viewed 30 million times.

On Weibo, China’s Twitter-like social media site, the original post has been shared 70,000 times and attracted 80,000 comments.

Some say the problem is a legal one. In 2006, a man in Nanjing who helped an injured woman get to a hospital was held financially responsible for her treatment on the grounds that he would only have helped if he were responsible.

Concern about the state of morality is reinforced by the frequency of these reports. Last year, a woman was stuffed into the trunk of a car and apparently kidnapped while bystanders did nothing. Also last year, a woman was slashed in an alley, and no witnesses offered help.

The case that arguably started the discussion took place in 2011, when a 2-year-old girl was hit by two vans and pedestrians simply walked by. Ultimately, the girl was carried to the side of a road by a street sweeper — a person often seen as at the lowest rungs of society — which further added to the nation’s anguish. The girl died a week later in the hospital.