Tian Yongming, who was initially sentenced for a series of violent crimes and then had his sentence changed to death early this year, has been executed in Yunnan province following approval from China's top court.

The execution was carried out by the Intermediate People's Court in Yuxi, Yunnan, on Tuesday, with local prosecutors supervising the process. Before the execution, Tian was allowed to meet with his family members.

The case dates back to September 1996, when Tian was sentenced to nine years in prison for the rape and attempted murder of his sister-in-law. After his release on July 15, 2002, he plotted revenge against the woman. On the night of Nov 13, 2002, he broke into her home armed with a knife.

As his sister-in-law fled the house, a villager named Liu Mingfu attempted to intervene. Tian fatally stabbed Liu and then caught up with his sister-in-law, stabbing her multiple times before bystanders intervened. He then evaded capture for nearly two decades.

Tian was apprehended on Feb 24, 2022, in Changsha, capital of Hunan province, after police tracked him to a rental apartment using video surveillance and intelligence analysis.

In November 2022, the Yuxi intermediate court sentenced Tian to death with a two-year reprieve for intentional homicide. Tian appealed to the Yunnan High People's Court, but on Oct 26, 2025, the conviction and sentence were both upheld due to the legal principle of "no increase in sentence upon appeal".

However, two days later, the high court announced a retrial, citing legal misapplications and an inappropriate original sentence.

In February, after rehearing the case, the high court imposed the death penalty on Tian, citing his blatant disregard for national laws and social ethics, and noting his lack of remorse and further violent actions, resulting in one death and one injury despite previous imprisonment.

The high court emphasized Tian's profoundly malicious intent and the particularly heinous nature of his offenses, posing a significant threat to society, so it changed his suspended death sentence to capital punishment.

The death sentence was then submitted to the Supreme People's Court, the country's top court, for final review. In China, all death sentences from lower courts must be ratified by the top court before execution.