Stand Tall to Fight for the Rights Granted by Law—The "Beihai Case" and the "Defense Counsel Team" Effect

On January 19, 2013, a seminar on the "Beihai Case" was held in Beihai, Guangxi, drawing public attention back to the case once again.

The "Beihai Case" is a case that has received widespread attention in the Chinese legal community in recent years. The defense counsel team, which became widely known starting from the "Beihai Case," has been a hotly debated phenomenon in the Chinese legal sphere over the past few years.

The "Beihai Case" consists of two parts: the "Case of the Four Beihai Attorneys Suspected of Perjury" and the "Case of Pei Chin-te and Others Suspected of Intentional Injury in Beihai." The brief facts of the case are as follows: On the night of November 13, 2009, in Beihai, Guangxi, rural youth brothers Pei Jih-hung and Pei Jih-liang were celebrating their birthdays and invited Pei Chin-te and other friends for a gathering, after which they went out for singing and drinking. Around 2:00 or 3:00 AM, after leaving the KTV, the group of young people had a dispute with Huang Huan-hai and others at an adjacent table while having a late-night snack. A minor brawl broke out between the two sides before they dispersed. On November 19 of the same month, a male corpse was discovered in the waters of the Beihai Aquatic Products Wharf. Upon identification, the deceased was determined to be Huang Huan-hai, and the police concluded it was a homicide. A few days later, Pei Chin-te, Pei Jih-hung, and two others were arrested. The case subsequently entered the trial stage. Four attorneys, including Yang Tsai-hsin and Yang Chung-han, served as defense counsel for the four defendants. During the defense process, Attorneys Yang Tsai-hsin and Yang Chung-han jointly investigated and gathered evidence from three witnesses. The method used was full audio and video recording, along with the preparation of inquiry records, in which the three witnesses proved that the defendants, including Pei Chin-te, lacked the opportunity to commit the crime (had no alibi). Afterward, Attorney Yang Tsai-hsin submitted this evidence to the court. This evidence, combined with the defendants retracting their statements in court, plunged the trial into a deadlock. Consequently, the Beihai City Procuratorate recommended that the public security authorities open an investigation into the three witnesses and four attorneys on suspicion of perjury. Thereafter, on June 14, 2011, the three witnesses investigated by Attorneys Yang Tsai-hsin and Yang Chung-han, as well as four attorneys including Yang Tsai-hsin and Yang Chung-han (the other two attorneys did not conduct any evidence gathering), were criminally detained by the Beihai Public Security on suspicion of the crime of perjury.

At that time, "Season Two of the Li Chuang Case" had just concluded with the Chongqing procuratorate withdrawing its prosecution a little over a month prior. "Former attorney" Li Chuang had just walked out of prison three days before, and the arrest of four attorneys in Beihai shocked the entire nation. Under the advocacy of Hunan attorney Yang Chin-chu, multiple attorneys from across the country quickly formed a defense team known as the "Northern Defense Counsel Team" and traveled to Beihai to rescue the four attorneys. As soon as the defense team intervened, the Beihai police changed the coercive measures for three of the attorneys to release on bail pending trial, while continuing to detain Attorney Yang Tsai-hsin.

Subsequently, the defense team learned that the injury case of Pei Chin-te and others handled by Attorney Yang Tsai-hsin involved serious issues such as torture under interrogation and the defendants lacking opportunity to commit the crime, making it highly likely to be a wrongful conviction. They therefore took over as defense counsel for Pei Chin-te and the other defendants. In October 2011, the case was tried continuously for 22 days, setting a record at the time for the longest criminal trial duration in mainland China (a record broken in 2012 by the 40-day trial of Li Ching-hung and others in Xiaohe, Guiyang, accused of gang-related crimes). The case gathered many of the most active frontline criminal defense attorneys on the internet at the time and pooled the attention of the national legal community and the public. Due to factors such as the detention facility placing obstacles to meetings, insulting security inspections of attorneys, manipulating defendants to dismiss their attorneys, unidentified individuals repeatedly surrounding and beating attorneys, attorneys being beaten at the courthouse entrance after leaving court, bizarre case details, severe torture under interrogation, the exclusion of illegal evidence, police officers testifying in court, testifying police officers threatening defense counsel in court, intense clashes between prosecution and defense, excessively long trial sessions, attorneys broadcasting case progress via Weibo and blogs, and the national public donating over 700,000 RMB to the defense team within three days, the "Beihai Case" became the hottest case of that year following the "Li Chuang Case."

The Sweeping "Defense Counsel Team Trend"

Following the widespread attention received by the "Beihai Case," the Beihai defense team also became a hot topic of discussion among the legal community and the public. Subsequently, under its demonstrative effect, the widely watched case of six young people in Changshu, Jiangsu, accused of affray for self-defense led to the formation of the Changshu Pro Bono Defense Team; the case of Li Ching-hung and 57 others in Guiyang, Guizhou, accused of organizing, leading, and participating in mafia-style organizations saw over 30 out-of-town attorneys form a pro bono defense team, which, together with retained and appointed defense counsel, brought the total number of participating attorneys to over a hundred. For a time, defense teams became all the rage in the Chinese legal community, seemingly sweeping across the nation.

Defense teams have actually always existed. The earliest defense teams consisted of rights-protection attorneys (the narrow concept of rights-protection attorneys should actually refer to a small number of admirable human rights lawyers, as a consensus has largely formed in the mainland legal community that all attorneys are rights-protection attorneys who safeguard rights) who defended defendants in extremely sensitive cases (such as national security cases and belief-based cases). Because of the homogeneous nature of these cases, multiple attorneys often jointly defended multiple co-defendants, maintaining basically consistent stances and defense arguments throughout the process. However, because these cases were extremely sensitive and faced severe suppression, defense teams of this period and the cases they defended were not widely known to the general public.

Before the "Beihai Case," the widely watched "Li Chuang Case" featured a large expert advisory group composed of numerous law professors, socially prominent figures, and attorneys. Coupled with the close connection between the trial defense counsel and the members of the advisory group, the concept of the defense team began to appear in the public eye.

In the "Beihai Case," the formal name of a defense team appeared for the first time. The 8 trial attorneys who stepped forward to rescue the 4 attorneys, along with backup attorneys, began to be formally called the "Northern Defense Counsel Team." Together with the 10 trial attorneys who later defended the "Beihai Injury Case," defense counsel for relevant witnesses, and the proxy lawyers, advisors, and backup attorneys for the related administrative litigation arising from the beating of attorneys, they were collectively referred to as the "Beihai Defense Counsel Team." During the case, the procuratorate amended the indictment three times, and trials lasted for 22 days. Members of the defense team extensively disclosed case details through blogs and Weibo, and media reports flooded in, triggering nationwide attention. For a time, the hearts and minds of the legal community gathered in Beihai, and a news headline in *Southern Weekly* reporting on the case even read, "Chinese Legal Community Locked in a Showdown with Beihai Police." As the case progressed, propelled by the outstanding work of the defense team and public discussion, the concept and format of the defense team finally burst onto the scene and garnered widespread attention.

In fact, mainland China's current laws do not include the concept of a defense team, and mainland laws even preclude the possibility of such a format existing, because procedural law stipulates that a single defendant may only retain 1 to 2 defenders, and potential conflicts of interest may exist among different co-defendants in the same case. This creates a professional ethics dilemma where defense teams might face conflicts of interest. However, the imported concept of the defense team emerged for realistic reasons: public power is excessively strong, and whether through legal provisions or practical circumstances, judicial protection for defendants' rights is so weak that public security authorities can fabricate cases against defendants using illegal methods such as torture under interrogation. In such instances, different co-defendants in the same case are all victims of judicial corruption, and conflicts of interest no longer exist among them. Meanwhile, mainland attorneys have long seen their practicing rights suppressed, making it difficult for individuals to confront law-bending public power. Yet, attorneys shoulder the natural mission of upholding the correct implementation of the law and safeguarding human rights. Under these circumstances, the emergence of defense teams very aptly resolved the problem of severely mismatched opposing forces. The emergence of the defense team strengthened the position of defense counsel in terms of numbers and presence. Furthermore, members of the defense team often utilized their blogs and Weibo accounts to publicize relevant case details to counter the artificial closure of the judiciary.

Stand Tall and Fight for It

Through such open resistance, the defense team broke the subservient and timid state of criminal defense that had long existed in mainland China's judicial sphere, injecting a completely new ethos into mainland criminal defense while telling criminal defense attorneys in mainland China: Do not kneel, do not squat; stand up, stand tall, practice law diligently, safeguard human rights, vow to struggle against illegal public power to the very end, and advance the rule of law in mainland China through resistance.

Through such resistance, the defense team told the public that the current judicial system has many problems that need to be improved; at the same time, it told the public that you must stand tall to fight for the rights granted to you by law, and everyone has a responsibility to struggle for their rights. Moreover, this resistance exposed imperfections and areas in need of improvement within the law, prompting the legislature to pay attention to patching these legal loopholes when amending laws. From the newly revised Chinese Criminal Procedure Law of 2012 and related judicial interpretations, it is evident that the legislature seriously studied the cases defended by these major defense teams and amended statutory provisions to target the procedural legal issues exposed by them.

The emergence of the defense team phenomenon symbolizes that an increasing number of attorneys are awakening to a consciousness of rights and are fighting for rights behind a backdrop of the public's increasingly awakening rights consciousness.