After 17 years of appeals, Wu Jixian, the former captain of the Criminal Police Brigade of the Xuzhou Economic Development Zone Branch of the Xuzhou Public Security Bureau, received a “Buddhist” reply from the Jiangsu Provincial People’s Procuratorate: “No one is without grievances, and all those with emotions are in karmic entanglement. The affairs of the world are in constant change, mountains and seas cannot be leveled, and it is difficult for all to follow their own hearts. The cases you are involved in are all in the past, why dwell on the past? I hope you can let go and stop appealing, and live peacefully now to avoid further suffering.”
After 17 years of appeals, Wu Jixian, the former captain of the Criminal Police Brigade of the Xuzhou Economic Development Zone Branch of the Xuzhou Public Security Bureau, received a “Buddhist” reply from the Jiangsu Provincial People’s Procuratorate: “No one is without grievances, and all those with emotions are in karmic entanglement. The affairs of the world are in constant change, mountains and seas cannot be leveled, and it is difficult for all to follow their own hearts. The cases you are involved in are all in the past, why dwell on the past? I hope you can let go and stop appealing, and live peacefully now to avoid further suffering.”
“A sentence ‘no one is without grievances,’ four words that are so light, erased my ten years of wrongful imprisonment, the destruction of my entire family, and half a lifetime of integrity.” Wu Jixian said that receiving this kind of reply was both a bad thing and a good thing. “The bad thing is that it made me feel waves of emotion, very angry and indignant; the good thing is that I can tell everyone that this is the procuratorate handing me a dagger to stab them.”
In September 2008, the People’s Court of Gulou District, Xuzhou City, found Wu Jixian guilty of accepting bribes of 116,000 yuan and sentenced him to ten years in prison for the crime of bribery.
The first instance court found that in May 2003, Wang Mou, who was involved in a gathering to fight, was wanted online, and his father sought help from Wu Jixian, and sent out 106,000 yuan on four occasions from September 2003 to November 2004. From October 2005 to April 2006, in order to revoke Wang Mou’s online wanted information, Zhuang Mougang gave Wu Jixian 10,000 yuan.
When handling Wang Mou’s case of gathering to fight, the People’s Procuratorate of Gulou District, Xuzhou City, found that on July 20, 2005, the Xuzhou Economic Development Zone Public Security Bureau revoked Wang Mou’s online wanted information without Wang Mou being arrested. Therefore, an investigation was launched.
Although Wu Jixian raised objections to the witness testimony and the time when Wang Mou’s online wanted information was revoked, the court did not accept them.
Wu Jixian appealed, claiming that he had not accepted bribes from Wang Mou’s father and Zhuang Mougang, and that he was innocent, but was rejected by the Intermediate People’s Court of Xuzhou City. He was released from prison in August 2017 after serving his sentence.
“I have never had my sentence reduced, never admitted guilt, and never compromised. Because I am innocent.” Wu Jixian said that the evidence adopted by the two courts to determine his “bribery” was only one “confession” and one “testimony” of verbal evidence, and there were problems such as procedural and substantive violations. He also said that he was subjected to torture to extract a confession.
Wu Jixian is 62 years old this year. He told “Fadu Law” that he began his appeal in prison, and it has been 17 years. Although his appeal has been rejected, he will not give up.
In February this year, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate sent a text message to Wu Jixian, informing him that the petition materials had been transferred to the Jiangsu Provincial Procuratorial authorities.
On the evening of April 3, the Jiangsu Provincial People’s Procuratorate sent a text message to Wu Jixian: It would not accept the complaint about the illegal handling of the case by the original case-handling authorities; if he did not accept the criminal judgment of the people’s court, he could prepare the materials and file a criminal appeal with the people’s court or file a criminal appeal with the people’s procuratorate at the same level as the effective judgment.
In addition, the text message also mentioned: “No one is without grievances, and all those with emotions are in karmic entanglement. The affairs of the world are in constant change, mountains and seas cannot be leveled, and it is difficult for all to follow their own hearts. The cases you are involved in are all in the past, why dwell on the past? I hope you can let go and stop appealing, and live peacefully now to avoid further suffering. Finally, I wish you a warm sun in your heart in the days to come, walk with ease, be at peace in the years, and be well in the time!!!”
After the news was released, it immediately triggered widespread discussion and questioning in the legal community.
“For many years, I have insisted on appealing according to law, petitioning according to law, and protecting my rights according to law, placing all my hopes on the truth-seeking and legally correcting errors of the judicial authorities. But I never expected that after I submitted the appeal materials to the Supreme People’s Procuratorate and they were transferred to the Jiangsu Provincial People’s Procuratorate, what I received was not a legal review, not an explanation of the law, not legal supervision, but a text message reply that chilled me to the bone.” Wu Jixian said that the procuratorial organs are the national legal supervision organs, and their duty is to supervise case handling, correct violations, redress grievances and wrongs, and maintain justice. It is not to persuade people to accept fate, not to teach people to let go, and not to use literary chicken soup to perfunctorily deal with the blood and tears of the people.
Public information shows that “no one is without grievances, and all those with emotions are in karmic entanglement” is a highly summarized core theme of Jin Yong’s martial arts novel “Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils” by the famous scholar and Redologist Chen Shixiang in a letter to Jin Yong in 1966. This sentence accurately reveals the tragic nature of the characters’ fate in the novel, that is, every character in the book, regardless of good or evil, high or low, bears their own grievances and misfortunes, and it is difficult to escape the fate of pain and disaster in emotional entanglements.
However, some people believe that it is inappropriate for judicial authorities to use it to persuade people to let go and stop appealing.
What was the original intention of the Jiangsu Provincial Procuratorate in releasing the relevant words? Is it appropriate? On April 9, “Fadu Law” called the Jiangsu Provincial People’s Procuratorate, but did not receive an effective response.
“Some colleagues said: ‘Put this procurator general in for half a year, and see if he still plays with poetry?’ Yes, if the sparks don’t splash on your own feet, you won’t feel that kind of piercing pain, and you can even play with poetry with you. What is reflected behind this is not only the indifference to the suffering of others, but also dereliction of duty and crime for some people and departments that shoulder the function of legal supervision and maintain social fairness and justice.” Huang Wentao, a criminal defense lawyer from Chongqing, told “Fadu Law”.
Zhang Xinnian, a well-known lawyer from Beijing Zhongwen Law Firm, also told “Fadu Law” that the relevant reply from the Jiangsu Provincial Procuratorate is a negative understanding of the construction of the rule of law, a complete betrayal of judicial conscience, a complete denial of the victory of justice, and a complete loss of faith in the rule of law, and it is also conclusive evidence of dereliction of duty. It is not only a direct disregard for the “implementation of a lifelong responsibility system for case handling quality and a responsibility accountability system for wrong cases, ensuring that case handling can withstand the test of law and history” proposed by the Fourth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee, but also a harmful spiritual chicken soup that makes people give up the spirit of struggle, compromise with illegal acts, and willingly be at the mercy of “fate”.
Lawyer Zhang Xinnian believes that the serious negligence exposed by the Jiangsu Provincial Procuratorate this time may attract the attention of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, and take this as an opportunity to carry out a work style rectification in the procuratorial system.
“It should be known that the People’s Procuratorate is a judicial organ that has the function of legal supervision and should strictly perform its duties according to law, effectively prevent wrongful convictions, and establish and improve a working mechanism to prevent wrongful convictions. It is a national treasure that governs the world, stabilizes the country, and maintains social fairness and justice, not a Buddhist pure land that is detached from the world, indifferent to the world, and broadly inclusive! The relevant staff are not living bodhisattvas who watch the years go by and persuade people to accept fate!” Lawyer Zhang Xinnian said.
Lv Puyu, the founding partner of Beijing Zeheng Law Firm and director of the Criminal Professional Committee, commented on the matter that this judicial logic violates the bottom line of judicial ethics, undermines the ultimate purpose of judicial maintenance of fairness and justice, and also harbors legal nihilism tendencies, which seriously impacts the public’s trust in judicial justice and the foundation of social order.
Lawyer Lv Puyu said that the judiciary is not only a tool for adjudicating individual cases, but also a barometer of social justice, conveying standards of right and wrong and value orientation to society through fair adjudication, guiding the public to respect the law and be good. If judicial officials recognize “all those with emotions are in karmic entanglement”, they will regard emotional entanglements and social contradictions as “karmic entanglements” that cannot be clarified, and will abandon the clear definition of right and wrong and the firm protection of legitimate rights and interests, leading to the loss of the value-leading function of judicial adjudication, and then causing social justice to lose its most authoritative guarantee.
“The judiciary is not a bystander of world affairs, but a changer of world affairs. The most essential color of a legal person is not to accept regrets, but to fight against regrets; not to default on injustice, but to fight for fairness. ‘No one is without grievances, and all those with emotions are in karmic entanglement’ can be a sigh about the world, but it can never become the creed of a judicial officer.” Lawyer Lv Puyu said.
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