Read Online A Death in the Lucky Holiday Hotel by Wenguang Huang Pin Ho - Free Book Online
Authors: Wenguang Huang Pin Ho
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outlets would occasionally push the envelope and run stories critical of the government or the police. Wang had no tolerance for any criticism. At a conference for Chongqing police officers in October 2010, Wang said:
In the future, if the newspapers distort the truth and attack our municipal public security bureau and individual police, we will sue both the media organization and the writer. If the news article mentions a certain individual policeman and caused negative consequences, the policeman will gather evidence and take the journalist to court. The bureau where the policeman works and other related organizations should coordinate and support the lawsuit. I call this practice “double lawsuits”—the public security organizations sue the newspaper and the policeman sues the reporter. Once we turn this into a lawsuit, the reporter will be a helpless spectator.
During Wang’s reign, the police department recruited 12,000 new officers and expanded the police force to 70,000, the largest in Asia. Wang also attempted to gain influence over the judicial process. In January 2011, he read a news report about the trial of an official with mafia ties. He wrote a comment on the margins of the article and sent it to the court, recommending capital punishment. Four months later, the official received the death penalty during the first trial.
Wang raised an uproar among legal scholars across China after he imprisoned a defense lawyer, charging him with fabricating testimony in favor of a mobster during the crackdown on organized crimes.
This is how it happened. In June 2009, an alleged crime boss was arrested by Chongqing police for murder, illegal weapons trade, drug dealing, and leading a criminal organization. On November 22, 2009, the defendant’s wife retained Li Zhuang, a well-known lawyer who worked for a prestigious law firm headed by a powerful princeling and who had defended many similar cases. During his research, Li found that Wang Lijun had established an interrogation center with a deceptive name, “The Militia Training Camp,” inside a mountain. Police used extensive torture while investigating defendants, including his client. Li raised the issue with the police.
Li’s legal work made him a target of persecution by Wang Lijun. On December 10, 2009, Chongqing police sent a telegram to the Beijing judiciary bureau, claiming that the Chongqing Detention Center’s audio and video records showed that Li had tried to entice his client to give false testimony by conveying his enticement through “winks.”Meanwhile, Li’s client also confessed to prosecutors that his lawyer had advised him to falsely testify that he had been beaten for eight days and nights and that he had become incontinent.
On the night of December 12, Li was secretly arrested in Beijing, and police escorted him back to Chongqing.
At the airport, Wang Lijun, flanked by more than one hundred police and journalists, waited for me on the tarmac. The plane was surrounded by ten light-flashing police cars. The policemen, armed with anti-riot gear, were dressed in camouflage uniforms, wearing helmets and black boots and carrying micro machine guns. Then, Wang pointed at me and shouted at his assistants. “You can do your job now.” The assistant came up and handcuffed me. Then, I heard him whisper to another policeman. “Be aware, he is someone who is a legal expert.” The policeman nodded, “Understood.”
He was thrown in a police car and the whole entourage followed them to the detention center, which was about four miles from the airport. The road was completely blocked by police. Li said Wang was, by nature, “melodramatic and a showoff,” but admitted that he was intimidated by the “welcome ceremony.” During the investigative process, Wang hired legal experts to advise the police department, teaching them how to skirt laws and regulations.
Li was tried, and in January 2010, the Chongqing
In the future, if the newspapers distort the truth and attack our municipal public security bureau and individual police, we will sue both the media organization and the writer. If the news article mentions a certain individual policeman and caused negative consequences, the policeman will gather evidence and take the journalist to court. The bureau where the policeman works and other related organizations should coordinate and support the lawsuit. I call this practice “double lawsuits”—the public security organizations sue the newspaper and the policeman sues the reporter. Once we turn this into a lawsuit, the reporter will be a helpless spectator.
During Wang’s reign, the police department recruited 12,000 new officers and expanded the police force to 70,000, the largest in Asia. Wang also attempted to gain influence over the judicial process. In January 2011, he read a news report about the trial of an official with mafia ties. He wrote a comment on the margins of the article and sent it to the court, recommending capital punishment. Four months later, the official received the death penalty during the first trial.
Wang raised an uproar among legal scholars across China after he imprisoned a defense lawyer, charging him with fabricating testimony in favor of a mobster during the crackdown on organized crimes.
This is how it happened. In June 2009, an alleged crime boss was arrested by Chongqing police for murder, illegal weapons trade, drug dealing, and leading a criminal organization. On November 22, 2009, the defendant’s wife retained Li Zhuang, a well-known lawyer who worked for a prestigious law firm headed by a powerful princeling and who had defended many similar cases. During his research, Li found that Wang Lijun had established an interrogation center with a deceptive name, “The Militia Training Camp,” inside a mountain. Police used extensive torture while investigating defendants, including his client. Li raised the issue with the police.
Li’s legal work made him a target of persecution by Wang Lijun. On December 10, 2009, Chongqing police sent a telegram to the Beijing judiciary bureau, claiming that the Chongqing Detention Center’s audio and video records showed that Li had tried to entice his client to give false testimony by conveying his enticement through “winks.”Meanwhile, Li’s client also confessed to prosecutors that his lawyer had advised him to falsely testify that he had been beaten for eight days and nights and that he had become incontinent.
On the night of December 12, Li was secretly arrested in Beijing, and police escorted him back to Chongqing.
At the airport, Wang Lijun, flanked by more than one hundred police and journalists, waited for me on the tarmac. The plane was surrounded by ten light-flashing police cars. The policemen, armed with anti-riot gear, were dressed in camouflage uniforms, wearing helmets and black boots and carrying micro machine guns. Then, Wang pointed at me and shouted at his assistants. “You can do your job now.” The assistant came up and handcuffed me. Then, I heard him whisper to another policeman. “Be aware, he is someone who is a legal expert.” The policeman nodded, “Understood.”
He was thrown in a police car and the whole entourage followed them to the detention center, which was about four miles from the airport. The road was completely blocked by police. Li said Wang was, by nature, “melodramatic and a showoff,” but admitted that he was intimidated by the “welcome ceremony.” During the investigative process, Wang hired legal experts to advise the police department, teaching them how to skirt laws and regulations.
Li was tried, and in January 2010, the Chongqing
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