GUANGZHOU - A court in South China's Guangdong province on Friday handed down in its first instance a death sentence to a man who set fire to a factory to vent his anger over a labor dispute in December 2012.

Liu Shuangyun, born in 1986, was a worker at an underwear factory in Xinxixi Village, Chendian Town in the city of Shantou. Liu set the fire to the factory in the afternoon of December 4, 2012 and fled the scene afterward.

Thirty workers were in the factory at the time and 14 of them died in the fire.

Liu said that his boss always docked his wages, so he sought revenge by setting fire to the factory.

The fire had caused a loss of 2.28 million yuan ($373,000).