Man jailed in China for kissing skulls, opening coffins at ancient burial site

A man in China has been given a nine-month suspended prison sentence after visiting an ancient burial site and desecrating three coffins in an attempt to make money from live-streaming it. according to a report by south china morning post, Villagers caught the 21-year-old man, surnamed Chen, entering the ancient Guoli cave burial site in March last year.

According to the report, Chen, with the help of two of his friends, opened three caskets and live-streamed a video of himself, which showed him removing bones from one casket. Not only this, he was also seen kissing skulls.

Notably, the site in question dates back to the Ming Dynasty and is known as a ‘coffin cave’, a traditional form of burial used by the Miao ethnic group in Guizhou. In 2015, the Guoli cave-style burial was listed as a provincial cultural relic protection site.

After the video surfaced on a video platform called Unmo, the Longli County People’s Procuratorate filed charges against her on 16 February. Initially, the police were not keen to press charges, but judicial officials insisted on prosecuting the person responsible for helping to protect the cultural relics.

Police said, “Not cracking down on such behavior would harm normal social order and the protection of local cultural relics.” The man then apologized to the descendants of those buried at the site and was later given a suspended prison sentence. was sentenced.

Meanwhile, the incident drew much criticism on social media websites in China, who were appalled by the man’s actions.

According to the SCMP, one person commented, “Even grave robbers know that opening a casket is unethical, and live-streamers who make money don’t have a bottom line.”

In a similar incident in Britain a junkie dug a grave To remove jewellery. According to BBC, Wayne Joslin, a 43-year-old drug addict and habitual criminal, dug up the graves of Kel and Maude Goodwin because he thought they contained priceless jewellery.