Frank Cao was sentenced Friday to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 16 years for the “completely gratuitous” murder of a woman he did not know. The killer strangled his victim with a belt and then hid the body in a car.
Published at 12:19 p.m.
“The victim was a no-nonsense businesswoman, a great person in the community who owned a well-known grocery store and restaurant in the community. It is very difficult to explain how this heinous crime could have been committed. There is only the defendant who knows why he did this,” Crown prosecutor Me Tian Meng said in a press briefing. During the trial, she teamed up with attorney Matthew Ferguson.
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Shao Jing Lu, also known as Tammy
Frank Cao, owner of two daycare centers in Montérégie, was found guilty by a jury last December of second-degree murder in the death of Shao Jing Lu, nicknamed Tammy. The 65-year-old was initially charged with first-degree murder.
On September 7, 2020, Frank Cao entered a residential tower on L'Île-des-Sœurs in Montreal. He had already lived there and retained his access there. The murderer waited in the underground car park for five hours. Around noon, he killed Tammy Lu as she walked to her vehicle.
A “very violent” murder, said the judge. Frank Cao strangled his victim, probably with the strap of his handbag. The murderer then hid the body at the foot of the rear passenger seat. So it was Tammy Lu's daughter who made the macabre discovery while searching for her mother for hours.
After the murder, Frank Cao hid in an emergency exit of the building for 13 minutes, then changed his clothes before driving away in his car. The killer apparently thought he would get away with it, but his DNA was found under the victim's fingernails and on her purse.
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Frank Cao
Why did Frank Cao attack Tammy Lu? There is nothing in the evidence to explain this. None of them knew each other. However, according to investigators, the most credible theory remains that Frank Cao wanted to kidnap the woman while drowning in debt.
Frank Cao was also arrested for extortion and kidnapping after the murder. However, he was acquitted and agreed not to contact the victim for a year. According to Judge Perreault, the evidence is “disturbing” because it involves a ransom note. However, she does not take this into account in her judgment.
Judge Perreault considers numerous aggravating factors in the murder case: the brutality of the violence, the premeditated nature of the crime, the vulnerability of the victim, the lack of motive and the devastating consequences for the victim's family. The only mitigating factors the judge cited were the lack of a criminal record and the fact that the killer was an asset to the company.
The Crown asked for an inadmissibility period of 15 to 17 years, insisting that the murder was unfounded, while the defense asked for 10 to 12 years because there was no criminal record. The jury suggested a period of 18 years. The judge finally made his decision when he was 16 years old.