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Bao Chang Wang, known as Ricky Wang, disappeared in 2017.
One of the men who helped hide a body found buried near Desert Rd in the center of the North Island was sentenced to house arrest.
Bao Chang Wang’s remains were found two years after his death. Police believe the father of two children was killed.
Yuzhen Zhang, 30, appeared in Auckland High Court on Wednesday to be sentenced after pleading guilty to being an accessory to the murder.
Judge Christian Whata said that Zhang was a hardworking family man, but also naive and that his offense was misplaced.
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The judge noted that Zhang was born in China under the country’s one-child policy and thus counted his close friends as family. It was through this misguided loyalty that he agreed to participate in helping his friend hide Wang’s body.
Judge Whata took time out of Zhang’s sentencing for his early guilty plea and prior good character. He sentenced the towel importer to six months of house arrest.
Court documents delivered to Stuff Zhang’s show associates told him about the murder in August 2017. He had also seen Wang’s body.
On August 21, 2017, Zhang and four other people went to an isolated location on Rangipo Rd in the Taupō district.
They took three vehicles and Zhang shared the drive.
The police summary of the events says that Wang’s body was inside a freezer that had been placed in the back of a van.
The body was buried in a shallow grave on a wasteland off Rangipo Intake Rd, 450 meters from Desert Rd.
Then concrete was poured over it.
The men returned to Auckland.
However, the next day, Zhang and three others repeated the trip.
They dug a second grave nearby before unearthing Wang’s body and reburying him in the deeper grave.
The police summary says that Wang, a father of two, was not reported missing for another two years.
Investigators found Wang’s remains in March 2020, after a search on Rangipo Intake Rd.
Two months later they interviewed Zhang.
Earlier this year, Yanlong Piao, 37, was jailed after he admitted to being an accessory to Wang’s murder in August 2017.
Two men accused of the murder have pleaded not guilty and are scheduled to go to trial in July 2021.
A 23-year-old man accused of being an accessory after the fact is due to stand trial in March 2021.
