Crowds enraged by murder of girl, 3

TAIPEI, Taiwan — The apparently random decapitation of a 3-year-old girl in front of her mother in low-crime Taipei this week has sparked outrage, calls to save the death penalty and questions about the island’s state of mental health care.

The attack on the child, who was walking behind her mother on the way to a metro station, has stunned and horrified inhabitants of greater Taipei, with the reaction at times verging on violence.

Hours after the girl was killed, a crowd gathered outside the police station where the slaying suspect was taken, some of them armed with baseball bats.

“I can’t accept this,” said Chiu Yuan-chao, Taipei mother of a 9-year-old, in a telephone interview. “This kind of person shouldn’t be allowed to enjoy the treatment of a normal person. I think all moms and dads will have this kind of view. This sort of incident is becoming something of a trend and my feeling is that the society is amid some sort of panic.”