Simon Yam Stabbed with Knife by Schizophrenic Attacker
While attending a promotional event in Zhongshan, Hong Kong actor Simon Yam (任達華) was stabbed with a knife in the stomach by a Chinese man. Simon was immediately sent to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, while the attacker was arrested at the scene.
Simon was on stage when the attack happened. Suddenly, a man charged on stage and stabbed Simon in the stomach and cut his right arm. Simon immediately backed away, with visible blood dripping from his stomach and hand. Security rushed to detain the attacker.
Sustaining minor injuries to his organs due to the knife wound, Simon was hospitalized and received a minor surgery at a hospital in Zhongshan. Last night at 11 p.m. the 64-year-old actor was transferred back to Hong Kong and is under care at a local hospital. Simon is placed in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), and doctors who will assess whether there was any nerve damage to his arm and see if further surgery is required. Three bodyguards are currently watching Simon at the hospital to ensure his safety.
According to police reports, the attacker is a 53-year-old man with the surname of Chen in Zhongshan City. Diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Chen confessed that his attack towards Simon was intentional.
Simon’s management company, Emperor Entertainment Group, thanks his fans and the hospital staff for their support and help. His team will be taking further legal action after investigation occurs, and take greater measures to protect their artistes’ safety when they work in Mainland China.
Though Simon is scheduled to commence his new movie in September, he will be postponing filming until his recovery.
This article is written by Hailey for JayneStars.com.
Saw the video last night and definitely freaked me out. Sadly, these types of harrowing incidents happen a lot on the Mainland, which is one of the drawbacks of attending events over there. But then again, the security detail sucked if they allowed a guest for their event to get injured like that. I don’t buy the explanation that they didn’t prevent the guy from going on stage because they thought he was one of the “executives” going up to get his picture taken with Simon — um, what executive wears a tank top to an event like this? And where was the EEG team? They just sent Simon over there by himself without an assistant, his manager, or other security detail? That’s what it seems like considering Simon actually had to reach out to his friends on Wechat / WhatsApp to find out where the nearest hospital was….to me, that’s something an assistant should be doing, especially with the type of injury Simon sustained (he was literally bleeding all over the place). Last time I checked, Simon is an A-list movie actor — that attacker should not have been able to get anywhere near him in a work-related event such as the one he was attending!
Hope Simon has a speedy recovery — he’s a great actor whose performances I’ve enjoyed watching since the 1980s and also one of the few genuinely nice and widely liked guys in the entertainment industry, so for someone to deliberately attack him like this is unfathomable. Wishing him all the best in his recovery!
@llwy12
Exactly how I felt and thought when this incident unfolded.
As a former security staff, the attacker shouldn’t have been able to get near Simon at all but he did. Judging from the video, the security staff took what seem like 10 seconds to respond from the other side of the stage. That is way too long. There should’ve been security staff at the outer perimeter and near the stage. There should’ve also been some type of barrier between the stage and the audience. Security should’ve responded the moment they saw some guy running towards the stage, but it looked like they didn’t respond until they saw Simon struggling with the suspect. This whole thing just seem poorly planned. Luckily simon didn’t suffer from any life threatening injuries.
The security staff that took the suspect down didn’t seem like they were professionally trained either. That was a lousy takedown.
@anon Exactly! And the part right after Simon is stabbed, where he’s running around the stage trying to avoid the attacker who continued to chase him? How ridiculous is that? What if he hadn’t been so alert and had fallen or something…that guy could’ve continued stabbing him and likely killed him!
Yes, I blame the event organizers for the horrible security detail, but Simon’s management company EEG should also shoulder the blame for not taking greater measures to protect their artists (and if the rumors are true about the original target being the building materials company whose event he was attending and Simon was merely in the wrong place at the wrong time, then that makes it worse because it also means EEG didn’t properly vet the job opportunity before accepting it for their artist).
Didn’t realize security is so lax and loose at public events. China’s not living up to its name as in police state.
Hoping Simon has 100% recovery.
@msxie0714
China is a police state in name, in practice, cops are generally quite chill there compared to the west. They don’t like to stir the pot unless they have to. Most of the time they prefer to act as mediators and deescalate issues verbally instead of using physical intervention unless its necessary.
@anon that’s a very kind way of putting it. I feel like mainland has only one rule: “If you can get away with it, do it.” If you don’t have to stand in line and can just push your way to the front, then do it. If want to charge customers 5RMB for the tissues they are gonna use on your table even though they are paying patrons, then do it. I rather not use the word “lazy”, but cops don’t know better because they are not trained properly. You NEVER question authority and there’s way too many people in China, so you just learn as you go and don’t need to be told what to do or how to do something right….a very Asian mentality especially Chinese.
@anon
“Police acting as mediators and deescalate issues verbally…….”
that’s so humane, unlike the overseas reputation of chinese cops being thuggish human rights violators
@msxie0714 – Had this been in the US, the perp would’ve been shot 100+ times. Security/cops tend to be trigger happy. Shoot first, ask questions later.
@pocky Yup, both extremes that are not favorable. Well, in the US, you shoot when the suspect is black or any minority #shotsfired #punintended