Translation:People v Li Qiaochu (2024)

Linyi Intermediate People’s Court of Shandong, PR China

Criminal Judgement

[2022] Lu 13 Xing Chu No 10

Prosecution Authority: The People’s Procuratorate of Linyi, Shandong (the ‘Prosecution’).

The Defendant, Li Qiaochu, female, Han Chinese, born on 13 January 1991 in Ghulja, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, master’s degree, unemployed, with household registration location and residence at Room 317, Building 3, Compound B-12, Zhongguancun South Avenue, Haidian District, Beijing. On suspicion of committing the crime of inciting subversion of state power, the Defendant was placed under residential surveillance at a designated location on 16 February 2020 by the Haidian Branch of the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau and was subsequently released on bail pending trial on 19 June of the same year. On 18 January 2021, this case was lawfully transferred to the Linyi Public Security Bureau of Shandong for handling; the Defendant was then criminally detained on 6 February of the same year, and her formal arrest was approved on 14 March of the same year. She is now detained in Linyi Detention Centre of Shandong.

Defence counsel: Ding Xikui, a lawyer with Beijing Weitai Law Firm.

On 28 February 2022, the Prosecution filed the present case with this Court by the Indictment [2022] Lin Jian Yibu Xingsu No Z1 against the Defendant for committing the crime of inciting subversion of state power. Following the jurisdiction designation decision of the Supreme People’s Court, this Court received and filed the case on 7 March of the same year, formed a collegial panel in compliance with the law, and held a pre-trial case management conference on 5 December 2023. Due to the involvement of state secrets in the case, this Court held a closed hearing on 19 December 2023. Assigned by the Prosecution, Prosecutors Tan Changzhi, Li Tao, and Lu Xiaowei appeared in court on behalf of the People to present the case. The Defendant and her defence counsel appeared before the court to attend the proceedings. With the approval of the Shandong High People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Court, the time limit for reaching an adjudication was lawfully extended. With the evaluation by the collegial panel and upon its subsequent submission to the Adjudication Committee of this Court for deliberation and decision, the trial of the case has now been concluded.

The Prosecution alleges that the Defendant and Xu Zhiyong (handled in a separate case) are in a romantic relationship, and the Defendant was profoundly influenced by the ideology of Xu. In September 2019, at the behest of Xu Zhiyong, the Defendant established a personal blog site for Xu and uploaded a large number of essays to the site composed by Xu with the nature of subverting the state power to propagate the propositions of Xu.

In response to the aforesaid allegations, the Prosecution has proclaimed and presented evidence in court as physical evidence, documentary evidence, testimony of witnesses, evaluative opinions, records of inspection, examination, and identification, as well as the confession and justification of the Defendant. The Prosecution holds that the Defendant has incited the subversion of the state power and the overthrow of the socialist system; her acts have thus violated the provision set out in Paragraph 2 of Article 105 of The Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China, and she shall therefore be held criminally responsible for the crime of inciting subversion of state power, and the Prosecution, thereby, pleads with this Court for a punishment according to law.

The Defendant has argued in court that the confessions she gave whilst under residential surveillance at a designated location are unlawful evidence and thus cannot serve as the basis to conclude the case, that she did not have a clear idea of the views in the essays of Xu Zhiyong, thereby she had no subjective intent of inciting subversion of state power, and that the evidence used in establishing her acts as an offence is solely her own confessions, constituting uncorroborated evidence.

The defence counsel has raised defence opinions as follows: There are issues with the judicial proceedings of this case, and the case shall be heard publicly; the confessions made by the Defendant whilst she was under residential surveillance at a designated location are unlawful evidence and thus cannot serve as the basis to conclude the case; the Defendant had no subjective intent to commit the offence; the evidence to establish that the acts of the Defendant constitute an offence is inadequate.

The Court, upon trial of this case, ascertains that: The Defendant and Xu Zhiyong (who has been sentenced for subverting the state power) are in a romantic relationship. In September 2019, at the behest of Xu Zhiyong, the Defendant established a personal blog site for Xu and uploaded essays to the site composed by Xu with the nature of subverting the state power to propagate the propositions of Xu.

The aforesaid facts are substantiated by the evidence presented, cross-examined in the court hearing and thereby confirmed by this Court as follows:

1. Testimony of witnesses.

(1) The ‘Witness Testimony of Zhang Zhongshun’ confirms the statement of the said witness as follows: Xu Zhiyong has composed essays such as ‘Non-violence’ and others, advocating the subversion of the state power by ‘non-violent’ means. I have read these essays composed by Xu. Xu and the members of his group have also been extensively utilising overseas social media to promote his political views.

(2) The ‘Witness Testimony of Xu Zhiyong’ confirms the statement of the said witness as follows: My blog site was registered in 2019 in my name by someone else, and it was used to post essays. As to who registered it, I prefer not to say. Some of the essays were published with my consent. I sent my essays via email to volunteers, who then posted them on the blog site for me; I would rather not disclose the identity of these volunteers.

2. Identification records.

(1) Xu Zhiyong has made an identification of the essays he composed, recognising those he wrote and had volunteers publish on his blog site.

(2) The Defendant has made an identification of the essays composed by Xu Zhiyong, acknowledging that among the essays, she has helped Xu post two hundred and seventy-three (273) of them on the blog site.

3. Documentary evidence.

The ‘Email Messages’ confirms that on 30 December 2019, the Defendant sent an email to Hua Ze’s electronic mailbox with the contents quoted as follows: ‘I am sending you some materials for backup that might be of use later.’ ‘By using a WordPress website and together with Xu Zhiyong, I have organised his past essays and sorted out some major events of his; last night, he messaged me, asking me to update the website with his newly completed essays.’

4. Physical evidence, search record, examination record, and evaluative opinions.

(1) On 31 December 2019, the investigators conducted a search of Xu Zhiyong’s residence, distraining a black HP laptop computer, a golden-yellow Apple mobile phone, and other articles used by the Defendant. Upon examination, traces of downloading and saving of a series of essays of Xu Zhiyong were found on the computer, and the web browser on it was found to have saved the web address for the backend editing of the blog site of Xu.

(2) On 16 February 2020, the investigators conducted a search of the temporary residence of the Defendant, distraining a silver HP laptop computer, a USB drive, and other articles used by the Defendant. Upon examination, traces of downloading essays of Xu Zhiyong were found on the computer, and the USB drive was found to contain tutorial videos for using WordPress.

5. Records of inspection and examination.

The ‘Record of Remote Inspection’ confirms the circumstances as follows: A search on the blog site of Xu Zhiyong has found essays such as ‘Non-violence’ on the site, and they were disseminated via the ‘China Citizens Movement’ website; an inspection of Xu’s Twitter account has verified the layout of his Twitter profile page, his postings of the essays and their online dissemination; an inspection of the Defendant’s Twitter account has verified her repostings of the contents of Xu’s Twitter account and Xu’s essays, as well as her engagement in the online dissemination.

6. Comprehensive evidence.

(1) The ‘Case Registration Form’, ‘Decision on Case Filing’, ‘Decision on the Designation of Jurisdiction’, ‘Detention Warrant’, ‘Decision on Residential Surveillance’, and ‘Arrest Warrant’ confirm the circumstances in the case filing and investigation of the alleged offence committed by the Defendant, the application of coercive measures against the Defendant, and the designation of jurisdiction of the case.

(2) The ‘Course of Apprehension’ confirms the relevant circumstances regarding the Defendant’s apprehension.

(3) The ‘Criminal Judgement’ and ‘Criminal Decision’ confirm the circumstance that Xu Zhiyong has been sentenced for committing the crime of subverting the state power.

(4) The ‘Household Registration Information’ of the Defendant confirms that the Defendant was born on 13 January 1991, originates from Ghulja, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, with her household registration location at Room 317, Building 3, Compound B-12, Zhongguancun South Avenue, Haidian District, Beijing.

7. The ‘Confession and Justification of the Defendant’.

The Defendant has made the confession as follows: I first met Xu Zhiyong at a communal meal of friends in 2017. In June 2019, we established a romantic relationship, and in early August 2019, we began living together. I have read some of his essays and have a certain understanding of his propositions and ideas; I can feel that the propositions of Xu Zhiyong have political purposes. Since I have feelings for him, I then wanted to help him by posting his essays on the website, fulfilling his desire to be known by others for who he is. In September 2019, Xu Zhiyong proposed creating a personal website, so I set up a personal blog site for him and contacted Hua Ze to change the web address. Xu Zhiyong had previously entrusted the website to Hua Ze for management because he initially wanted his friends abroad to help him post essays; however, after taking over Xu’s personal blog site, Hua did not engage much in the managing activities, and thus, the vast majority of the later essays were updated by me at the behest of Xu. I created the website in September 2019, and by November of the same year, I had posted all the earlier essays of Xu Zhiyong on the site. After I finished updating the essays of Xu Zhiyong, I then sent both the web address and the username of his personal blog site to Hua Ze. I have posted two hundred and seventy-three (273) essays in total on the personal blog site of Xu Zhiyong, all of which I have attested with my signature one by one to confirm.

In response to the justification made by the Defendant and the defence opinions raised by her defence counsel, this Court, based on the facts and evidence of this case, has assessed with deliberation as follows:

1. With regard to the defence opinion raised by the defence counsel concerning the procedural issues in this case, upon examination, this Court has conducted the trial of this case in accordance with the ‘Decision on the Designation of Jurisdiction’ issued by the Supreme People’s Court, which ensures the judicial proceedings are lawful. According to the relevant laws and regulations on confidentiality, a public security organ of a prefecture-level city may determine secret-level state secrets. The Linyi Public Security Bureau has classified such evidentiary materials in this case as the relevant verbal evidence, electronic data and others as secret-level state secrets. In accordance with Article 188 of The Criminal Procedure Law of the People’s Republic of China, cases involving state secrets are not tried in public. Therefore, the closed hearing of this case conforms to the provisions of the law. Thus, the relevant defence opinions of the defence counsel are untenable to establish and are therefore not adopted by this Court.

2. With regard to the justification made by the Defendant and the defence opinions raised by her defence counsel that the confessions given by the Defendant whilst she was under residential surveillance at a designated location are unlawful evidence and thus cannot serve as the basis to conclude the case, upon examination, the evidence on which the conclusion of this case is based was all lawfully obtained by the investigation authority, no clues or materials indicate circumstances of illegal obtainment of evidence existed in this case, the evidence is able to mutually corroborate and is lawful and valid, and thus it can serve as the basis to conclude the case. Thus, the relevant justification of the Defendant and the relevant defence opinions of her defence counsel are untenable to establish and are therefore not adopted by this Court.

3. With regard to the justification made by the Defendant and the defence opinions raised by her defence counsel that the evidence to establish that the acts of the Defendant constitute an offence is inadequate and that her acts thus do not constitute the crime of inciting subversion of state power, upon examination, and based on the confession of the Defendant, testimony from witnesses Xu Zhiyong and Zhang Zhongshun, records of inspection and examination, evaluative opinions, and other evidence related, it is established that the Defendant established a romantic relationship with Xu Zhiyong, lived together with him, and has commented on his essays; it is therefore evident that she was fully aware of Xu’s propositions as well as the content and nature of the relevant essays, and yet she still built a personal website and posted essays for him, thereby helping to disseminate and propagate ideas of subverting the state power; her acts thus conform to the constituent elements of the crime of inciting subversion of state power. Thus, the relevant justification of the Defendant and the relevant defence opinions of her defence counsel are untenable to establish and are therefore not adopted by this Court.

This Court holds that the Defendant has established a personal blog site for Xu Zhiyong and assisted him in uploading essays to the site aiming at subverting state power; her acts have thus constituted the crime of inciting subversion of state power. The criminal facts alleged by the Prosecution against the Defendant for committing the crime of inciting subversion of state power are clear, the evidence is reliable and sufficient, and therefore, the charges are established. Based on the facts, nature, circumstances, and societal harm of the crime committed by the Defendant and in accordance with Paragraph 2 of Article 105, Paragraph 1 of Article 55, Paragraph 1 of Article 56, and Article 64 of The Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China, the Court hereby rules that:

I. The Defendant committed the crime of inciting subversion of state power and is sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of three (3) years and eight (8) months, with two (2) years of deprivation of political rights; (The term of imprisonment shall be counted from the date of execution of the judgement; where the Defendant is detained on remand prior to the execution of the judgement, one day of such detention shall be credited as one day of the sentence; where the Defendant is placed under residential surveillance at a designated location, two days of such residential surveillance shall be credited as one day of the sentence, therefore, the term of imprisonment begins on 6 February 2021 and ends on 3 August 2024.) and

II. The laptop computers, mobile phone, USB drive and other articles distrained from the Defendant by the public security organ were all assets used by the Defendant in her committal of the crime and are, therefore, to be confiscated according to law.

If the Defendant refuses to accept the present judgement as final and binding, a petition for appeal may be submitted through this Court or directly to the Shandong High People’s Court within ten (10) days commencing on the day following the day of receipt of this judgement. In case of a written appeal, one (1) original copy and two (2) duplicated copies of the petition shall be submitted.