The No. 2 Branch of the Beijing Municipal People's Procuratorate Monday formally approved the arrest of Fu Hegong for the October robbery and murder of a kindergarten teacher and a child in Beijing.

The unemployed 30-year-old suspect lived in Miyun District, on the outskirts of the capital city. He allegedly broke into the Beixinqiao Kindergarten in urban Dongcheng District in the early morning hours of October 21 to steal DVD and VCD players. While inside, he killed a 44-year-old nursery attendant and a five-year-old boy.

The child's body was found stuffed into a washing machine.

Fu is also accused of killing a watchman surnamed Deng as he was stealing computers from a company on August 25.

A spokesman for the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau said that the police caught Fu in a Beijing hotel two days after the kindergarten tragedy, and that Fu confessed the robbery and murder.

In 1996, Fu was sentenced to seven years in prison in neighboring Hebei Province for theft. He was given early parole in 2001.

(Xinhua News Agency November 30, 2004)