Murdered couple 'killed by others'

Olwen Dudgeon

A STUDENT accused of murdering a Chinese couple told a jury yesterday that they were both still alive when he left them at his home on the night they were allegedly killed.

Lu Yao Jia said Jin Xue, 38, and his wife Li Xie, 35, were bound in suitcases but “certainly they were alive” when he last saw them.

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He told Leeds Crown Court he was shocked when he later returned to the house in Kensington Way, Leeds, and heard they were dead.

He said he had only agreed to help another man, Liang Zhang, tie the couple up after Zhang said a friend of his was involved in a dispute with the couple who owned the Timboo takeaway in Fairfield Road, Bramley, Leeds.

He anticipated they would be taken away by Zhang’s friend to another country and made to work for them.

That would leave the Timboo without an owner, enabling Zhang to “acquire” it. Jia said Zhang promised him 20 per cent of the profits to help.

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On July 24, last year after the couple were driven to a house in Holborn Grove by another defendant, Ji Peng, they were tied up and gagged.

Jia accepted he also helped place them in two suitcases and drove Peng’s Ford Mondeo in which they were moved to Kensington Way where Peng also lived.

Jia said he waited for Zhang’s friend or friends to arrive while Peng went out to meet Zhang. Half an hour later a man of Chinese origin arrived at the house.

He wanted to see the couple in the suitcases and asked if anyone else was in the house. Jia said he showed him there was no one else there “and then he said I had to leave”.

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Jia said he returned to Holborn Grove. Later he, Peng and Zhang went back to Kensington Way and Zhang then told him the couple were dead, killed by other people. The bodies were in the garage and he helped move the female’s into a different suitcase because the original one was damaged.

Jia, 20 and Peng, 25 both admit kidnapping but deny murder. The jury has heard Zhang returned to China before arrests were made.The trial continues.