Xiantao Shang, pictured outside the ACT Courts in 2023 after he was granted bail. Photo: Albert McKnight.
A home invader accused of assaulting a married couple while looking for a woman who he claimed owed him $100,000 has been found guilty of all charges.
Xiantao Shang, 38, faced a judge-alone trial in the ACT Supreme Court that began earlier this year, although his friend, 46-year-old Wengao Zheng, had already pleaded guilty over his involvement.
Shang denied the allegations, but on Thursday (3 July), Justice Verity McWilliam found him guilty of one count of burglary and two counts of assault, all by joint commission.
In her published decision, she said Shang and Zheng claimed a woman called ‘Linda’ owed them a combined $125,000 in what was an apparently gambling-related debt.
‘Linda’ kept avoiding them, including by leaving Canberra at one stage, but they thought they managed to track her down with the assistance of her former lover.
On the evening of 25 June 2023, they went to the Belconnen apartment where they expected to find her, but a different woman opened the door.
It was alleged the pair, who this woman had never seen before, barged into the apartment uninvited and, while speaking Mandarin, demanded to speak to a person whose name she didn’t immediately recognise.
The men were told to leave, but didn’t and continued demanding to see this person.
“You are trespassing and I don’t even know this person who you are talking about,” the woman’s husband said he told them.
After the husband told the pair to get out of their home, a scuffle broke out in the hallway. The pair allegedly kicked and punched the husband and wife multiple times in their faces and bodies.
During and after the assault, the couple said they heard Zheng say, “I am ex-special forces. Do you think you can beat me up?” and “Do you know what we do in China? We were in the special forces”.
The husband and wife were left with bruises all over their bodies after the assault.
Wengao Zheng, pictured in 2023, has already pleaded guilty and been sentenced over his role. Photo: Albert McKnight.
Shang’s lawyers denied there had been any agreement between their client and Zheng to commit an offence, denied he assaulted anyone and said he acted in self-defence during the scuffle.
When the woman testified, she admitted ‘Linda’ had stayed at their apartment for several days before the incident. She said the home invaders had been asking for ‘Linda’ by her Chinese name.
When Zheng testified, he claimed the husband hadn’t let them leave the apartment and he assaulted them first.
“If they beat me, I definitely need to beat them back,” Zheng said.
But he accepted he couldn’t recall how many times he hit the woman as he lost control. He also accepted he told them he was from the special forces in China, but this was a lie and he had never been in the military.
Justice McWilliam said Zheng gave a confused version of events that was patently unreliable and rejected his evidence.
She was satisfied Shang and Zheng knew they did not have permission to stay in the apartment, but refused to leave because they wanted to get the couple to tell them where ‘Linda’ had gone.
“The period of time during which the accused and co-offender flatly refused to leave the apartment despite the male complainant pushing the accused was of sufficient length to cross the threshold from mistake or even inadvertent rudeness to intentional menacing behaviour,” she said.
Justice McWilliam found Shang brutally beat the husband with his fists then kicked him on the ground, then he also pushed the woman in the chest and kicked her, too.
The prosecutor did not ask to revoke Shang’s bail and it was continued, while sentencing was set to begin on 10 September.
Zheng was sentenced on charges of burglary and assault by joint commission last year.
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