Chinese Crime Novelist Accused Of Unsolved 1995 Bludgeoning Murders

A Chinese crime novelist’s darkest story may be the one about himself.

Liu Yongbiao, 53, who penned a book called “The Guilty Secret,” has been arrested on suspicion of bludgeoning to death four people, including a child, to cover up a robbery 22 years ago, according to local reports.

Liu was taken into custody on Friday after police in eastern China’s Zhejiang province linked him to the 1995 killings through DNA evidence, Chinese news site Sixth Tone reported, citing its sister publication, The Paper.

“I’ve been waiting for you here all this time,” Liu reportedly told police when they arrived at his home in neighboring Anhui province.

He handed arresting officers a letter for his wife, The South China Morning Post reported.

“These past 20 years, I have been waiting for this day,” his letter read. “And today, there is finally an ending. I can finally be free from the mental torment I’ve endured for so long.”

Authorities said Liu and a second man carried out the beating deaths at a hostel in Huzhou, Zhejiang province, in November 1995, according to Sixth Tone.

The killers checked in to the hostel with a plan to rob other guests, authorities said. When a man caught them, they beat him to death. To cover up their crimes, they fatally bludgeoned the couple who ran the hostel and their 13-year-old grandson, authorities said.

The case went cold and stayed that way for years, with the killers having no obvious ties to the victims.

Police reopened the case in June and used modern DNA technology to analyze fingerprints, footprints and towels used by the suspects at the hostel, government-operated news site China.org reported.

“We reopened the investigation several times over the years. There was no progress until we used new DNA technology when we reopened the case again in June,” Shen Lianjiang, Huzhou public security bureau’s deputy director, told China Daily.

Liu’s alleged accomplice, a 64-year-old man only identified by his last name of Wang, was arrested soon after Liu was seized.

Liu, in the preface of his novel, “The Guilty Secret,” said he was working on another book with a working title: “The Beautiful Writer Who Killed.” He said it would be about a female author who gets away with a string of murders, according to The New York Times.