Home » Opinion » Chinese Views
Mishaps of 'nobodies' trigger law changes
By Li Huizi and Cheng Zhuo |
November 2, 2009, Monday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
CHINESE legislators are hoping that a proposed change to the country's compensation law will bring an end to wrongful convictions and the abuse of rights by organs of the state.
The draft amendment to the State Compensation Law is expected to pass when the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress votes on the change.
It follows a string of public controversies concerning abuses - sometimes resulting in deaths - by state officials and agencies.
Legislators accelerated revision process after the death of 24-year-old Li Qiaoming in a detention center in the southwestern Yunnan Province in February, which aroused nationwide concern.
Li's death highlighted failings in the existing law, which does not include abuse, only physical assault. Nor does it cover the failure by law enforcement departments, such as detention houses, to prevent assault or abuse.
In the draft amendment, detention centers are listed along with the police, prosecutors, courts and prisons as having an obligation to compensate people for violating their rights in criminal cases.
Li was initially reported to have died during a "hide-and-seek" game on February 8. But later he was found to have been beaten to death by three other inmates. Two police officers were sentenced to jail terms for dereliction of duty in connection with the death.
Widespread coverage of the case by the media and heated debate online about human rights protection in detention houses pressured the police and prosecutors to investigate the case and lawmakers to amend the law.
Similar cases have exposed legal loopholes or problems of government administration, and the high-profile mishaps of the many nobodies have in fact accelerated the legal process of China, the hard way.
In the most recent known case, Sun Zhongjie, a driver from central Henan Province, was fined and had his car confiscated in Shanghai for allegedly conducting an "illegal cab operation" on October 14, after he picked up a pedestrian who asked for a lift.
Three minutes later, the hitchhiker threw a 10-yuan-note (US$1.46) at him and jumped out. He disappeared when several people walked up to Sun and claimed they were from transport enforcement.
Sun, 18, said he was ensnared by the urban management staff who were in charge of investigating unlicensed taxis, or "black cabs".
Sun's car was confiscated and that evening he cut off a piece of the little finger on his left to protest his innocence.
Online forums were soon flooded with criticisms of the Shanghai Pudong New Area government, which was forced to conduct a thorough investigation.
In the end, the Pudong government apologized last Monday for entrapping innocent motorists in sting operations against illegal cabs.
It acknowledged that the transport supervision team used wrongful methods to collect evidence.
The death of Sun Zhigang, a 27-year-old college graduate in a holding center for vagrants in the southern city of Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, led to the abolition of a law that allowed city authorities to detain and send homeless or jobless persons caught without residence permits back to their hometown.
The case of She Xianglin, who was wrongly jailed for 11 years for a murder that never happened, was covered extensively by the media.
The former security guard from Hubei Province was convicted on the basis of a "confession" of killing his wife, despite the fact that her body was never found.
He said he was deprived of sleep during 10 days of interrogation until he signed documents admitting to the murder.
He was finally cleared in 2005 after his "dead" wife reappeared in her hometown.
She's 11 years in jail led to China's legislation against "forced confession" and a nationwide campaign among the judiciary to root out such practices.
In another case, Nie Shubin, a young farmer in northern Hebei Province, was executed in 1994 after being convicted of rape and murder.
However, a rape-and-murder suspect arrested in 2005 admitted he had committed the crime. The real killer was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve.
As a result, the Supreme People's Court took back the right to review death penalty sentences from provincial courts in 2007 to prevent further miscarriages of justice.
Judicial authorities also improved ways of obtaining and reviewing evidence and verdicts.
In June, Zhang Haichao, a 28-year-old worker in Henan Province, made headlines as he sought to prove a compensation claim by undergoing a biopsy. Zhang underwent the operation to prove he suffered pneumoconiosis after he was denied compensation for the debilitating lung disease caused by working at a brick factory.
It took Zhang both time and physical pain to settle his case. He had campaigned for two years to have his case recognized, and eventually, he was given treatment and compensation of 615,000 yuan (US$90,064) from the brick factory in Henan where he used to work.
As a result, six local health officials and doctors were either sacked or suspended and the Ministry of Health ordered improvements in treatment of occupational diseases for migrant workers.
Legal experts maintain that it has been common in many other countries that individual cases became milestones in the legal history and helped speed up the development of the rule of law.
But such "milestone" cases of public concern are more frequent in China, and the amendments and revisions to the existing statutes in tandem are equally conspicuous.
(The authors are Xinhua writers.)
The draft amendment to the State Compensation Law is expected to pass when the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress votes on the change.
It follows a string of public controversies concerning abuses - sometimes resulting in deaths - by state officials and agencies.
Legislators accelerated revision process after the death of 24-year-old Li Qiaoming in a detention center in the southwestern Yunnan Province in February, which aroused nationwide concern.
Li's death highlighted failings in the existing law, which does not include abuse, only physical assault. Nor does it cover the failure by law enforcement departments, such as detention houses, to prevent assault or abuse.
In the draft amendment, detention centers are listed along with the police, prosecutors, courts and prisons as having an obligation to compensate people for violating their rights in criminal cases.
Li was initially reported to have died during a "hide-and-seek" game on February 8. But later he was found to have been beaten to death by three other inmates. Two police officers were sentenced to jail terms for dereliction of duty in connection with the death.
Widespread coverage of the case by the media and heated debate online about human rights protection in detention houses pressured the police and prosecutors to investigate the case and lawmakers to amend the law.
Similar cases have exposed legal loopholes or problems of government administration, and the high-profile mishaps of the many nobodies have in fact accelerated the legal process of China, the hard way.
In the most recent known case, Sun Zhongjie, a driver from central Henan Province, was fined and had his car confiscated in Shanghai for allegedly conducting an "illegal cab operation" on October 14, after he picked up a pedestrian who asked for a lift.
Three minutes later, the hitchhiker threw a 10-yuan-note (US$1.46) at him and jumped out. He disappeared when several people walked up to Sun and claimed they were from transport enforcement.
Sun, 18, said he was ensnared by the urban management staff who were in charge of investigating unlicensed taxis, or "black cabs".
Sun's car was confiscated and that evening he cut off a piece of the little finger on his left to protest his innocence.
Online forums were soon flooded with criticisms of the Shanghai Pudong New Area government, which was forced to conduct a thorough investigation.
In the end, the Pudong government apologized last Monday for entrapping innocent motorists in sting operations against illegal cabs.
It acknowledged that the transport supervision team used wrongful methods to collect evidence.
The death of Sun Zhigang, a 27-year-old college graduate in a holding center for vagrants in the southern city of Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, led to the abolition of a law that allowed city authorities to detain and send homeless or jobless persons caught without residence permits back to their hometown.
The case of She Xianglin, who was wrongly jailed for 11 years for a murder that never happened, was covered extensively by the media.
The former security guard from Hubei Province was convicted on the basis of a "confession" of killing his wife, despite the fact that her body was never found.
He said he was deprived of sleep during 10 days of interrogation until he signed documents admitting to the murder.
He was finally cleared in 2005 after his "dead" wife reappeared in her hometown.
She's 11 years in jail led to China's legislation against "forced confession" and a nationwide campaign among the judiciary to root out such practices.
In another case, Nie Shubin, a young farmer in northern Hebei Province, was executed in 1994 after being convicted of rape and murder.
However, a rape-and-murder suspect arrested in 2005 admitted he had committed the crime. The real killer was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve.
As a result, the Supreme People's Court took back the right to review death penalty sentences from provincial courts in 2007 to prevent further miscarriages of justice.
Judicial authorities also improved ways of obtaining and reviewing evidence and verdicts.
In June, Zhang Haichao, a 28-year-old worker in Henan Province, made headlines as he sought to prove a compensation claim by undergoing a biopsy. Zhang underwent the operation to prove he suffered pneumoconiosis after he was denied compensation for the debilitating lung disease caused by working at a brick factory.
It took Zhang both time and physical pain to settle his case. He had campaigned for two years to have his case recognized, and eventually, he was given treatment and compensation of 615,000 yuan (US$90,064) from the brick factory in Henan where he used to work.
As a result, six local health officials and doctors were either sacked or suspended and the Ministry of Health ordered improvements in treatment of occupational diseases for migrant workers.
Legal experts maintain that it has been common in many other countries that individual cases became milestones in the legal history and helped speed up the development of the rule of law.
But such "milestone" cases of public concern are more frequent in China, and the amendments and revisions to the existing statutes in tandem are equally conspicuous.
(The authors are Xinhua writers.)
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