On this date in 2001, an infamous crime lord and 13 members of his gang were put to death in two Hunan Province cities.

Suave serial bank robber Zhang Jun had a reported 28 deaths on his conscience, including such underworld classics as forcing a lover to execute someone in order to prove her loyalty, in a years-long spree of robbery and mayhem. He was a major catch early in China’s execution-rich “strike hard” crime crackdown.

Despite-slash-because of the body trail, the cool Zhang — who appeared in court dressed modishly and flaunting such indifference to death that he disdained to defend himself — attracted a strain of fandom for his “gangland chic”.

He’s kind of like the gangsters in the movies, really likable.

The authorities, and his many victims, liked him less.

A still shot from the broadcast of Zhang Jun’s trial.

According to Courts and Criminal Justice in Contemporary China, the gang’s trial had the distinction of being the first ever broadcast live in China.

Zhang Jun’s trial was notable for its ripples in other media as well. The Committee to Protect Journalists reported that several writers and editors were demoted or fired after publishing a story in Nanfang Zhoumo (Southern Weekend) exploring the gang’s roots in poverty and inequality … a take deemed inimical to the dialectical historical march of the Peoples’ Republic. (See here for some of the more approved commentary angles.)

On this day..

• 1527: Hans Hergot, immovable type
• 1952: Jan Bula, Czechoslovakian priest
• Feast Day of St. Baudilus
• 1622: Sultan Osman II
• 1691: Mark Baggot, Jacobite spy
• 1799: Simon Taylor, for indulging in drunkenness
• 1795: Ignac Martinovics and the Magyar Jacobins
• 2001: An adult actress stoned to death in Evin prison
• 1881: Po'olua, "darkened in my mind"
• 1943: Wilhelm H., pensioner and vandal
• 1987: Edward Earl Johnson, "I guess nobody is going to call"
• 1820: Karl Ludwig Sand, a curious strand of German history