SHIJIAZHUANG - Yang Haijun, former deputy principal of a primary school in North China's Hebei province, was executed on Saturday for kidnapping and killing a girl and then molesting her body.

Yang, 47, former deputy head of Wang'an Township Central Primary School of Laiyuan County, was convicted of kidnapping the girl on July 27, 2013 to demand ransom from her parents.

He took the six-year-girl back to his home and suffocated her after she cried and shouted. The pedophile then abused her body and buried her near the border between Laiyuan and Yuxian counties on the same day.

Police detained him on August 2, 2013 on suspicion of intentional homicide. He was sentenced to death in December, but appealed. The Higher People's Court of Hebei Province rejected Yang Haijun's appeal and upheld the death penalty last year.