Police have apprehended a local man suspected of a series of killings going back to 1985.

　　Shanghai security Bureau said yesterday that Gu Manbao, 52, is suspected of five robberies and killing four women and injuring one in 1985 and 1998.

　　He was apprehended on April 27.

　　Bureau spokeswoman Chen Rongrong said Gu was involved in two traffic accidents in 2000 and this year after he took up a job as a taxi driver.

　　"We found material evidence left by Gu in the accidents was identical to that on the murder scenes," she said.

　　Gu was driving his Santana taxi on Dalian Road, Yangpu District, when several police cars surrounded him at the intersection with Liaoyuan Road W.

　　He was sent to the city General Team of Criminal Cases Investigation, Chen said.

　　Police say the killings began in 1985 - a year after Gu was released after four years in jail.

　　"Gu, who was unemployed, came up with the idea of robbery and murder in order to take vengeance on society," police alleged.

　　On may 4 that year Gu allegedly took a bus to an apartment building in Putuo District, pretended to chat with an old woman on the fourth floor and killed her when he found she was alone at home.

　　The next month Gu used similar tactics in Zhabei, Hongkou and Luwan districts, resulting in two deaths and one injury and the theft of property including watches, bank cards and TV sets, the bureau said.

　　A special task force was set up and more than 20,000 policemen took part in the investigation.

　　"Gu became a mechanic in a local factory, got married, and set up a family of his own," police said.

　　"He quit his job in 1992 and took up driving a taxi."

　　After leading a normal life for 13 years, Gu returned to crime in 1998 when his wife divorced him because he could not pay off gambling debts, Chen said.

　　On april 17, 1998, Gu allegedly went to Yangpu District and got into an apartment by telling a woman who was home alone he would buy it.

　　"But he strangled the woman named Wang in the kitchen," the police spokeswoman said.