1928 Fairfield murders

On August 22, 1928, a mass murder took place at the Bryan ranch near Fairfield, California, United States. A former worker, Leung Ying, killed eleven people, including the farm's foreman and six of his family members, in a mixed shooting and ax attack.

Leung was caught a day later during a manhunt and following his confession, Leung's actions were attributed to mental instability caused by long-term narcotic addiction. He was sentenced to death the same month in a one-day trial. About three weeks before his scheduled execution date, Leung committed suicide by hanging while on death row.

The Bryan ranch killings were the worst case of mass murder in California history at that time, surpassing the killing of six persons each by James Dunham on a farm in Santa Clara County in 1896, and by John Goins in Stockton and Galt in 1926.^[3][4]

The Bryan ranch, also known as the Wong Gee ranch, was a 65 acres (0.26 km²) property,^[1] located in unincorporated Solano County at the Suisun Slough, five miles southwest of Fairfield.^[5] The ranch, operated as a pear and peach orchard,^[4][5] was run by Wong Gee (Chinese: 黃朱), also known as Wong Fook Hong (Chinese: 黃福康),^[6][7] who had obtained the land under a forty-year lease prior to the 1913 Alien Land Law.^[1] Wong, previously a foreman at the A.T. Hatch ranch in Suisun Valley,^[7][8] was part of nearby Rockville's Chinatown community, most of whom hailed from Dachong. The Bryan ranch mainly employed fellow Chinese labourers from the Hatch colony as farm hands.^[5][9][10]

On September 18, 1927, eleven months prior to the murders, 38-year-old Jung Lee Fong, a Chinese worker from the nearby S.C. Armstrong ranch, ran amok at the Bryan ranch, reportedly following a dispute over fruit deliveries with Wong Gee. Jung set fire to the living quarters of the workers and their families using a five gallon barrel of coal oil and armed with an iron bar (later misreported as an axe), he injured five laborers who tried to intervene. Jung was seen dancing around the fire when Wong Gee appeared. Jung attacked Wong with a still-burning torch, at which point Wong fatally shot Jung in the windpipe.^[8][11][12] Wong was arrested by responding officer Ernest Lockie and jailed,^[11] but released the next day. The killing was later declared an act of self-defense by the superior court.^[7][13][14]

Solano County had previously gained local notoriety for a different axe murder, in which there were also suspicions of a Chinese perpetrator. On October 17, 1927, 88-year-old Margaret Coghan Shelly, an Irish-born widow, was found dead in her home, having been bludgeoned to death two days earlier. Shelly's Chinese tenant, Sam Wong, was initially suspected before witness testimony implicated Choy Kim, who had fled the area for San Francisco before escaping back to China. Although Solano County police and the Bureau of Immigration had tracked down Choy Kim's location in China, extradition was not approved by Chinese authorities due to a law requiring eyewitnesses to crimes.^[15]

In the spring of 1928, Leung Ying was employed for about three months as a cook and fruit picker. Leung was eventually dismissed in June for attacking and attempting to rape Wong Gee's daughter Nellie,^[16] though he would later claim that it was a consensual affair. Leung repeatedly tried to reapply for a job at the ranch, but was turned down each time.^[17] Relatives of the Wong family later also maintained that Leung was instead dismissed for his inability to work due to his regular narcotics use.^[1]

In the morning hours of August 22, 1928, Leung, under the influence of "dope",^[3] either opium^[14] or cocaine,^[18] returned to the Bryan ranch, armed with a stockless .25-35 rifle^[18] (also described as a sawn-off shotgun).^[5]

According to a police reconstruction, Leung first entered what was variously identified as an underground gambling room, or a dugout, where Wong Gee was reportedly smoking an opium pipe.^[13] At least one worker was also present, either playing a card game with Wong Gee,^[14] or looking to get the day's work orders.^[5] Leung opened fire, killing Wong Gee with a shot through the heart and fatally wounding worker Cheung Yueng, who crawled for the main door before succumbing to his wounds.^[5] The Oakland Tribune gave a different account, stating that Wong Gee (misspelled as "Ge Tong") was in the dugout to wake two sleeping workers, Cheung (named as "Chan Yim") and Wa Wey (named as "Wah Toy"). Per this version, Wong Gee was killed while standing and Cheung was killed fully dressed on a bed, while Wa was shot in the back as he fled.^[4] Another recollection of the dugout shooting by the county sheriff, Jack Thornton, claimed that only two people, Wong Gee and Wong Wing Hong, were killed with shots to the torso.^[19]

Leung next went to the residence of Wong Hueng, Wong Gee's brother, which doubled as either a laundry house or office. Leung could not enter as the occupant had locked himself inside and attempted to hide under a bed, but Leung shot through a window, hitting Wong Hueng in the abdomen.^[20] Leung then made his way to the cutting shed, which was the home of the ranch's cook, Low Shek Way, who was wounded by a shot through the stomach. Low was later taken to Fairfield hospital, where he died a few hours later.^[21] While walking half a mile through towards the home of Wong Gee, Leung shot and killed worker Yeung Foon, who was standing in an orchard collecting pears.^[4][1] Another worker was able to escape the shooting to the neighboring farm of Wong Gee's half-brother, Sam Wong, using a telephone there to call police.^[4][20] The Thornton account claimed that Wong Hueng, as Wong Wing Hong, had already been killed at the dugout, identifying the man killed at the laundry house as "the boy of Low Chuck Way", who was shot twice, with the first gunshot breaking his left leg and the second stiking him in the heart. Afterwards, Yeung, identified as "Yung Fong", was stated to have been shot to death in his bed in a shack 200 yards (180 m) from the laundry house before Low Chuck Way was killed after crossing paths with Leung in the orchard.^[19]

At the house's porch, Leung shot fifteen-year-old Nellie Wong in the abdomen as she was walking down some steps to go to school in Rockville. Shortly after he entered the home, Wong Gee's wife, cradling her ten-day old son, appeared in the doorway. Leung killed her with a shot between the eyes. Afterwards, Leung walked into the children's room, where Wong Gee's sons, four-year-old Johnnie and three-year-old Willie, were asleep in beds. Johnnie was shot through the head at close range while Willie died of cranial injuries when Leung crushed his skull with either his axe or a cleaver from the kitchen. It's presumed that Leung had run out of ammunition by then.^[13] Before leaving the house, Leung mutilated Mrs. Wong's body with the hatchet, then turned her over to fatally slash the baby's throat, nearly decapitating him. Two of Wong Gee's other children, seven-year-old Ruth and nine-year-old Helen,^[5] escaped unharmed by hiding under a bed in a room located at the back of the Wong residence.^[4][22] Nellie died in Vallejo hospital on August 27, becoming the eleventh and final victim.^[23] In less than twenty minutes, he had killed or fatally wounded eleven people.^[24][25]

Leung Ying eventually escaped in a sedan owned by Wong Gee. George and Mary Athanacio, a Spanish couple who lived just a few yards from the Wong residence, saw Leung rummaging through the pockets of Wong Gee, Cheung, and Wa before fleeing the scene from their window. George Athanacio also headed for Sam Wong's ranch to use the phone.^[4][1] Beginning around 1:00 p.m. that same day,^[26] a manhunt, led by Solano County Sheriff John R. Thornton, was conducted in Solano and Napa Counties, heavily patrolling the section of I-80 E between Fairfield and Sacramento. The perpetrator's identity was disputed for several hours following the killings.^[27][28] The name of the manhunt's subject was frequently misspelled, leading to news reports misnaming Leung Ying as Leung Wing,^[29] Leung Ling,^[10] Ming Ying,^[24] and Loy Yeung, which became the most widespread name for Leung.^[3][30]

Leung initially headed for north towards Sacramento,^[31] but turned back south at Dixon, presumably into the Bay Area with the destination of Oakland.^[29] In Nevada County, Leung abandoned the stolen car and broke into the house of George Sing. At gunpoint, Leung commandeered Sing's truck and forced Sing to chaffeur him to the Chinatown area of Nevada City, where he had a brother.^[3][32] While in Chinatown, a police patrol questioned Leung, unaware that he was holding the driver of the truck at gunpoint. Since he displayed a calm demeanor and gave a convincing alibi, Leung was let go.^[33] After this, Leung made Sing drive to his workplace at the Empire Mine, where Leung stole food from the kitchen.^[32]

At around 11:00 p.m., Nevada County Sheriff George Carter and Deputy Sheriff Arthur Hellings spotted Leung in Sing's truck, following him through the night. In the early morning of August 23, the patrol car saw Leung throwing his rifle into some bushes during the ride near Colfax. After recovering the gun, Carter and Hellings continued to follow Leung until around 6:00 a.m., when he jumped off the truck near Grass Valley. The policemen observed as Leung wandered into an abandoned ranch and hid himself in a chicken coop to sleep. Five minutes later, the officers revealed themselves and shouted for Leung to surrender.^[4] He exited his hiding place without resistance and asked the arresting officers for morphine.^[32] A search of his person yielded "a small black bag, a quantity of Chinese cake, some trinkets and about $100 (equivalent to $1,875 in 2025) in money".^[3] After a few photos were taken of the arresting officers with Leung, he was taken to Nevada City, where he was held until the arrival of the Solano County authorities.^[34]

Nine victims died at the scene, a tenth died the same day at a hospital while the eleventh victim died five days later.^[20][35] Four of the dead, including Wong Gee, were members of the Hong San tong,^[36] although other sources name it the more well-known Bing Kong Tong;^[37][38] the articles claim that Leung Ying, a former Hop Sing Tong member, was also part of the organisation, despite the Hop Sing Tong and Bing Kong Tong being rivals at the time.^[37] One source connects victims Low Shek Way (named as Low Chuck Way) and Wa Wey (named as Jim Low) as father and son.^[10] One of the injured workers was identified as Gee Fop.^[24]

The names and ages of the deceased, particularly those of the four laborers, were reported inconsistently across the press. The workers were also named as Chaim Im, Wong Foon, Jim Low, and Low Chuck Way,^[10] or Phan Gyim, Young Moon, Wah Toy, and Way Wing,^[24] or Chew Yue, Yong Fong, Won Win Fong, and Low Check.^[39][40] Reports after the manhunt consistently identify them as Low Quen Yee, Young Gum Foon, Low Way Wey, and Low Fong.^[38][41]

Wong Gee's name was first widely misreported as Wong Tong, his nephew, who had temporarily held the lease while his uncle spent time back in China a few years earlier.^[1] Early reports also claim that the Wong residence was attacked first^[10] and that Nellie Wong had leapt out of a window before being shot in the back as she fled.^[42]

Leung Ying (simplified Chinese: 梁颖; traditional Chinese: 梁穎; pinyin: Liáng Yǐng; Jyutping: loeng4 wing6) was born in Canton, China, and immigrated to California, United States, with his parents in the 1900s when he was a child. His father was a prosperous farmer in Stockton for twenty years, with both of Leung's parents returning to Canton a few years earlier.^[43] Reports directly after the killings described contradictory ages for Leung, typically as 32 years old, and once as 35,^[29][44] but the majority of articles after his arrest give his age as 29. Leung did not know his own birthdate and estimated he was 29 or 30.^[43]

Leung, who also went by the names Wong Gay and Lim Onn,^[4] previously lived in San Jose, where he was employed at a packing plant.^[3] While in San Jose, he was a member of the city's Hop Sing Tong branch, until he was expelled due to his excessive use of narcotics. In 1924, he had been arrested by San Francisco police as a gunman and narcotics peddler. Among other Chinese laborers, Leung was already known as a self-admitted murderer, having boasted about fatally shooting three people during a tong war. In addition to his narcotic sales, Leung was also reported to trade in alcohol, which was outlawed at the time, and to procure white prostitutes for numerous ranches.^[4] He lived in Oakland Chinatown at the time of the murders.^[29]

Leung demanded he be given "the needle" before he would confess,^[3] admitting he had an addiction and showing police his own needle.^[32] During his interrogation, Leung readily admitted to having committed the murders, and stated that he had seen the two police officers trailing him during the night, and, although he had had the opportunity to shoot them at any time, he had refrained from doing so, because he feared he would be hanged if he killed a white man.^[4] When asked for a motive, Leung initially recited the story of his love for Nellie Wong and the disapproval of this relationship by her family. Furthermore, he claimed that a "drug-inspired dream" had convinced him that the Wong Gee family and other friends were trying to kill him with poisoned cake. He had previously shown one cake in his possession to the arresting sheriff as one such example.^{[3][14][45][46]} Leung claimed he had begun using drugs as a way to cope with his romantic rejection and firing from the ranch,^[17] despite his usage of narcotics being documented earlier from his residence in San Jose^[3] and existent opium addiction by workers of the Suisun Chinese community.^[14]

In interviews with the press, however, he instead stated that incessant teasing about his lack of intelligence and physical appearance (Leung was of below average height and had deep pockmark scars on his face, likely from smallpox) had pushed him to commit the murders.^[5][14] Leung was also locally regarded as a "hophead" for his chronic opium dependence, which was discouraged among the workforce, and led to him being regularly deprived of drugs.^[13][14] He also expressed his admiration for Californian robbers and murderers Joe Tanko and Floyd Hall, saying: "I just like Tanko and Hall – very, very sick."^[17][18]

Media also speculated that the murders were gang violence related to the Tong Wars, since it was rumored that there was a $10,000 bounty on Wong Gee for killing another rampaging worker, Jung Lee Fong, a member of a rival tong, the prior year.^[4] Shortly after the beginning of the manhunt, Solano County Sheriff J.R. Thornton dismissed any tong involvement, first speculating about a personal feud between Wong and Leung^[1] and later blaming Leung's drug use as resulting in mental instability.^[47][48] Similarly, the Hop Sing Tong and the Bing Kong Tong were in agreement that the matter was not gang-related and did not warrant a conflict between the two organisations, although they did warn that if Leung were to escape, both tongs would hunt him down "for weeks, months, years if necessary".^[38]

The night after his arrest Leung Ying attempted to hang himself with a blanket. This reportedly occurred after hundreds of tong delegates, most of the Hong San and Bing Kong, congregated around the jail, demanding to be granted access to Leung. Prison guards were alerted by the sound of running water, which Leung had turned to muffle his death throes, finding Leung with the makeshift rope around his neck, about to jump from his bunk.^[36] After the attempt was foiled, he spent the night beating his head against the floor and walls, crying for narcotics.^[30] The next day, on August 24, Leung was arraigned at the Superior Court in Suisun City, where he again admitted committing the murders, stating he wished he had the opportunity to kill half a dozen more.^[49] He also proclaimed that he "wished to die" and interrupted the testimony of two medical examiners regarding the shooting of Yeung Foon by shouting his agreement of their findings.^[50] While in Solano County jail, Leung attempted to convince a guard to temporarily release him, stating that his only regret was that he had not yet killed "a certain elderly Chinese woman" and would return should he be allowed to commit the deed.^[5]

Leung's legal process took place at Solano County Superior Court in Fairfield. On August 27, as Leung arrived for a preliminary hearing, two Chinese men attempted to lunge at the prisoner, but were prevented by the Solano County sheriff and deputies. The men were arrested and a search revealed a six-inch blade and a sharpened eight-inch iron bar, but they were let go with a warning.^[43][42]

Leung's trial began in the afternoon hours of August 30^[43] and was described as one of the shortest formal murder trials in state history.^[44] While Leung declined his right to an attorney,^[33] presiding judge W. T. McDonnell^[44] assigned Kenneth I. Jones as his defense counsel, despite Jones' protest over representing a murderer. State assessors and the county sheriff declared Leung sane. After a five-minute recess, Leung pleaded guilty.^[43] In the morning hours of August 31,^[43] less than 24 hours after the trial's beginning, the verdict was read, sentencing Leung to death by hanging.^[44] In reaction to this, Leung reportedly laughed uproariously and said through an interpreter that he was "glad it was all over".^[33][51]

Leung's execution was to take place on November 9 of the same year;^[52] Leung was set to be hanged alongside three others, a trio of bank robbers, which would have made it the first time four executions were held on the same day at San Quentin Prison.^[53]

On October 22, 1928, after six weeks on death row, Leung killed himself in his prison cell in San Quentin Prison between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. He had knotted a towel into a noose and tied it around a bar at the cell door, asphyxiating himself by leaning forwards in a standing position. Leung's cellmate, Leong Fook^[54] (also erroneously spelled as Leon Fook and Lee Sook), did not alert the correctional staff.^[55][56] Leung's suicide was the first successful instance on San Quentin's death row.^[57] In November 1928, the handmade noose was given to Sheriff Jack Thornton by Warden James Holohan as an exhibit piece for the Solano County jail.^[58] Leung was buried in San Quentin prison cemetery, where he was buried as "Leong Ying", with Ying used as his last name.^[33]

In the October 1928 issue of 2-0 Police Journal, the manhunt was praised as an example of cooperation between law enforcement officers across different counties.^[19]

Although the killings were widely publicized in its immediate aftermath, the event became disregarded as its effects were confined to the Chinese community, which faced considerable ostracization. Closer coverage lasted only a week, ending with Leung Ying's death sentence. His death went largely unnoticed, as his name was again misspelled, this time as "Leong Ying", in all contemporary reports.^[56]

Sam Wong took ownership of the ranch and together with the family tong, Sam Wong arranged the interment of the dead.^[1][50] Two days after the murders, a funeral procession was held in Suisun City for six of the deceased, the Wong family (the initially unnamed infant was buried with his mother and Nellie Wong had not yet died by this point) and one of the workers, identified as Young Gum Foon. The rites used a mix of Buddhist, Chinese folk religion and Christian burial traditions. The dead were initially buried in a mass grave in Rockville's cemetery. In 1952, the Tung Sen Benevolent Association, a huiguan for immigrants from the Longdu area of Zhongshan, exhumed the bodies and reburied them at a Chinese cemetery near Colma. The surviving Wong sisters, Ruth and Helen, were relocated to San Francisco and eventually became nurses.^[5] The three other fatalities Low Fong, Low Quen Yee, and Low Way Wey, were repatriated to China for burial.^[38] Rockville Chinatown was deserted six months after the killings.^[5]

The December 1985 issue of the Solano Historian magazine published a June 2, 1981 speech to the California Historical Society by journalist Evelyn Lockie, who was a resident of Rockville and involved with its Chinatown community in the 1920s. Lockie was familiar with the family of Wong Gee, who was a friend of her father and traveled to the scene of the Bryan ranch murders as a reporter for The Sacramento Bee, unaware of who the victims were until the deputy in charge mentioned their names. Lockie wrote a speech to commemorate the killings over fifty years after the murders to call for a memorial to the victims as well as Rockville's now largely abandoned Chinatown.^[7][5]

• List of shootings in California

• Lockie, Evelyn: The Village That Vanished in Solano Historian, December 1985.
• Waters, Tony: When killing is a crime; Lynne Rienner Publishers Inc, 2007. ISBN 978-1-58826-514-2
• Solano's Sheriff – Jack Thornton Makes Record in Capturing Murderous Chinese Gunman, in 2-0 Police Journal; October 1928 (p. 8).
• [1]; Leung, Peter C.Y. and Waters, Tony "Chinese Pioneer Farming Families in the Suisun Valley of California, " in 150 Year of Chinese Presence in California, published by the Sacramento Chinese Cultural Foundation and Asian-American Studies, University of California, Davis 2001.
• Chaddock, Don: Cemetery Tales: Ying and Young, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, October 27, 2022 (includes mugshot)

• Chinese community falls apart after mass murder, Daily Republic (March 23, 2001)
• Eleven Chinese, Time (September 3, 1928)
• Runs amuck and kills 10, The New York Times (August 23, 1928)
• Capture California Chinese Killer, The New York Times (August 24, 1928)
• Chinaman runs amuck; 10 dead, The Atlanta Constitution (August 23, 1928)
• Chinese slayer of ten caught in chicken house, The Atlanta Constitution (August 24, 1928)
• Chinese massacres ten, Los Angeles Times (August 23, 1928)
• Chinese Cook Slays Nine Persons, Wounds 6 Others With Rifle and Hatchet, The Hartford Courant (August 23, 1928)
• Chinese, Who Killed 10, Sought 6 More Lives, The Washington Post (August 25, 1928)
• Chinese cook goes on rampage and kills 9, Eugene Register-Guard (August 22, 1928)
• Chinese killer of 10 is terror to countryside, Miami Daily News (August 23, 1928)
• Slayer of ten, The Pittsburgh Press (August 28, 1928)
• Murderer of Ten - And Victims, San Jose News (August 23, 1928)
• Crazed Chinaman slays 10 persons, The Ludington Daily News (August 23, 1928)
• Chinese slayer is sought by posses, The Owosso Argus-Press (August 23, 1928)
• Ten Chinese dead when worker runs amok with pistol, The Palm Beach Post (August 23, 1928)
• Maniac who murdered ten persons caught by police, The Evening Independent (August 24, 1928)