Beijing  - A court in central China's Hubei province on Monday sentenced to death a man convicted of killing eight people, including his former lover, six of his employees and a two-year-old boy.

The Intermediate People's Court in Hubei's Suizhou city convicted Xiong Zhenlin, 35, of murdering the eight people with axes and hammers on January 4, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The victims included Xiong's former lover, Zhu Deqing, and her two-year-old grandson.

Xiong was also convicted of battering to death three men and three women who he employed at his scrap yard in Suizhou's Luoyang town.

Police arrested him in the provincial capital one week after the murders, following a national appeal for information, the agency said.

An earlier report in the official China Daily newspaper said Xiong's rampage was motivated by "career and love setbacks, coupled with anti-social behaviour and narrow-mindedness.

The newspaper quoted police as saying Xiong confessed to planning to murder nine more people, including his ex-wife, who he had recently divorced in the hope of marrying Zhu.

Zhu refused to marry Xiong, and his scrap business struggled after a slump in global prices and the withdrawal of cash for his divorce settlement, it said.

Xiong later tried to reconcile with his ex-wife but she also refused him.

Police investigators concluded that he was left "severely distressed by the collapse of his fortune and family", the newspaper said. (dpa)