0007 Avoiding suspicion
"The defendant, Xue Bo, male, born on March 7, 1981, Han ethnicity, primary school education, unemployed, and without a fixed residence in Shanghai. In April 2019, he was sentenced to eight months imprisonment and fined RMB 4,000 by the J District People's Court of Shanghai for the crime of introducing prostitution. On March 7, 2022, he was criminally detained by the C District Branch of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau on suspicion of organizing prostitution."
The one-month review and prosecution period for Xue Bo's organized prostitution case was about to expire. Zhai knew he couldn't delay any longer and had to make a decision as soon as possible, so he began drafting the indictment.
But when he wrote the last paragraph, stating what crime the court believed he should be held criminally liable for, his hand stopped on the keyboard.
It wasn't that he forgot how to write, or that he had run out of inspiration; rather, he seemed to have guessed what expression his defense lawyer would have when he received a copy of the indictment.
I never hesitated to do this.
He suddenly remembered his time as a prosecutor's assistant, not long ago. He didn't need to think about these things; he just needed to type up the charges and sentencing recommendations confirmed by the prosecutor.
For the past four years, he had been hoping to shed his assistant role and become a full-fledged, independent prosecutor. Now that he had achieved his goal, he was beginning to miss the past.
Whether it was due to his base nature or because his thoughts were swayed by insignificant people, he couldn't know.
His lack of decisiveness made Zhai somewhat agitated, yet he couldn't bring himself to make a hasty decision. He scratched his head, leaned back in his chair, and tried to find a foothold to ease his complex emotions.
Just as he was about to go through the evidence in his hands one last time, someone knocked on the office door.
"Zhai, are you busy?"
The person who came to see him was Ling Yedong, the prosecutor who had partnered with Zhai for four years and was now the newly promoted director of the second department. Zhai had learned all the professional skills a prosecutor should possess from him, such as interrogation, questioning, and cross-examination.
Zhai stood up and asked him, "Prosecutor Ling, what's the matter?"
Ling Yedong handed him a picture: "Is this license plate yours?"
Zhai looked over, his face filled with confusion: "How could this be?"
After confirming it was his car, Ling Yedong explained his purpose: "It really is yours. Well, you can't take the car away right now. We need it as evidence in a case, so you might have to make do with it for the next few days."
Zhai had been wondering about this for the past couple of days. He'd only had a flat tire, and the car had been under repair for days without any contact from him. Finally, a colleague reached out, leaving him both amused and exasperated. He asked, "What case?"
“Do you remember Old Zhou’s car dealership?” Ling Yedong spread his hands. “Old Zhou went to jail, didn’t he? Now his son has taken over the dealership and renamed it Little Zhou’s Car Dealership. As a result, this guy inherited his father’s criminal methods as well. The case was just sent to me.”
Zhai remembered that Lao Zhou's car dealership was a case he and Ling Yedong handled together two years ago.
The perpetrator, Lao Zhou, owned a car dealership called Lao Zhou's Car Shop. To attract more business, he deliberately placed homemade utility knife blades on two streets near his shop. After passing vehicles were run over, the owners would take their cars to his shop for repairs. Later, a cyclist reported the incident to the police, and Lao Zhou was apprehended.
He and Ling Yedong were prosecuted for endangering public safety by dangerous means, and the court ultimately sentenced Lao Zhou to four years in prison.
As a result, while Lao Zhou was still serving his sentence, his son repeated the same mistake.
"How could such a bizarre thing happen?" The secretary standing nearby couldn't help but exclaim.
Ling Yedong smiled and casually asked Zhai Shi, "What case are you working on lately?"
Zhai replied: "It's a legal aid case involving organized prostitution."
Ling Yedong: "What do you mean?"
Zhai didn't understand what he meant and thought he was asking about the progress of the case, so he replied without thinking, "The indictment is being prepared and will be transferred to the court in the next couple of days."
Ling Yedong changed his tune: "I mean, does the criminal suspect plead guilty and accept punishment?"
Zhai was taken aback, his eyelids drooping slightly, seemingly somewhat frustrated: "No, he refused to sign."
Ling Yedong didn't delve into the matter or blame anyone; he simply continued, "Has the police investigation yielded any results?"
Zhai shook his head again.
Ling Yedong remained calm and didn't ask any more questions. His words carried a hint of well-intentioned advice, like a wise and patient elder: "It's alright. Just prepare well. You can't afford to mess up your first case."
Zhai gave a barely audible "hmm," something he didn't really mean. But he glanced around; the office, decorated with greenery, lacked any vibrant life. Some people were listless and passive, others indifferent. It felt like being in a cage, a feeling of being trapped like a caged beast.
What he really wanted to ask Ling Yedong was: After helping someone become a principal offender, shouldn't the charges be carefully considered? For example, in Xue Bo's case, should he be charged with organizing prostitution as an accessory, or with assisting in organizing prostitution?
But he knew Ling Yedong wouldn't answer that question, and it wasn't their primary concern.
Four years ago, Zhai encountered his first case after passing the exam at the C District Procuratorate. It was a case of a man in his sixties throwing an axe out of a seventh-floor window, damaging two BMWs. At that time, the Eleventh Amendment to the Criminal Law had not yet been promulgated, and there was no crime of throwing objects from a height. Ling Yedong wanted to define it as endangering public safety by dangerous means and asked Zhai for his opinion.
Zhai, a recent graduate of F University's School of Criminal Law, was spirited and audacious, his deep eyes like two unpolished gems, possessing an unadorned clarity: "This is debatable. According to the prevailing academic view, to constitute the crime of endangering public safety by dangerous means, the act must cause an unspecified expansion of the danger. However, throwing objects from a height can only cause damage to specific people or objects. For example, in this case, the damage was fixed the moment the axe hit the ground—two BMWs."
His words were reasonable and well-founded, but until the first-instance judgment took effect and the defendant was sentenced to three years in prison, no third person other than himself and Ling Yedong heard them.
The case later attracted much attention, and the prosecutor in charge, Ling Yedong, was promoted to deputy director of the Second Department. In an interview with the legal program of Shanghai TV, he spoke at length about the inescapable duty to protect the people's "safety above their heads".
The outcome satisfied everyone, except for Zhai.
He tried to convince himself that it was because there was a difference between theory and practice. Just like Ling Yedong said, he would be fine once his student-like demeanor faded.
Spending too much time in one environment can lead to assimilation and subjugation; if not, it's only a matter of time. Gradually, he abandoned his skepticism and stopped overthinking, becoming like a puppet on a string, with a bunch of performance indicators waiting to be met on the other side. These included things like the percentage of guilty pleas, the number of corrected offenses, and the success rate of appeals.
Four years had passed, and Zhai thought he had perfectly integrated into the community. But then, Qu Zhong, oblivious to the situation, stood before him and told him about the principle of legality in criminal law.
The principle of legality in criminal law—it sounds like a distant dream.
...
The car was used as evidence, so Zhai has to take the subway to work now.
Yes, it was the only option, a last resort.
So when he saw Qu Zhong again in the same carriage the next day, he defined it as a chance encounter with a low probability event.
Today, Qu Zhong wore a dress with a design similar to a cheongsam. The base was plain white and dignified, while the flamboyant and lively embroidery was irregularly clustered on the skirt. It was somewhat discordant yet just right, much like Qu Zhong herself.
She swayed as she entered the subway, graceful as a magnolia blossom perched high on a branch. She stood out from everyone around her, like a highlighted section in black and white ink, drawing everyone's attention.
Zhai still had a seat today, but after seeing the high heels on her feet, he stood up without thinking before the subway doors closed.
As soon as I stood up, an older woman sat down without hesitation, so quickly that it was hard not to suspect that she had been eyeing me for a long time.
Zhai was slightly taken aback; it wasn't quite what he had expected.
Qu Zhong's voice drifted lazily from ahead, teasing him: "I've never seen you so gentlemanly before."
Zhai raised her eyes.
The weather forecast was cloudy, but sunlight shone in her eyes.
"Good morning," he greeted somewhat stiffly.
Qu Zhong replied with a symbolic "Good morning," then took a step and stood a short distance away from him.
The citrus has transformed into sandalwood; that's her scent today.
Looking at her fair arms and overly prominent cleavage, Zhai was somewhat aroused. Before he could have any further thoughts, he heard Qu Zhong speak emotionlessly: "Shouldn't you be writing the indictment against Xue Bo?"
The sound was neither too loud nor too soft, almost drowned out by the arrival announcement, but Zhai could still hear it clearly.
Like being caught in a rain shower, all irrationality was instantly extinguished.
It's always about cases; she insists on talking to him about them right away.
And what was he thinking? He wanted to offer her his seat but failed, and he was thinking about her incredibly alluring body beneath her clothes...
A mix of annoyance, regret, and embarrassment welled up inside him. Zhai Shi raised an eyebrow in frustration. He had no desire to discuss work with her here. He thought he was speaking with great righteousness: "The prosecution and defense should avoid suspicion in private."
Huh? Qu Zhong thought she misheard. Now she's telling her to avoid suspicion, but when she dragged her to a hotel a couple of days ago, why didn't she think about avoiding suspicion then?
Qu Zhong let out a mocking laugh, and taking advantage of the gap in passengers getting in and out as the next station approached, she bypassed him without looking to the side and squeezed through the crowd to another carriage.
Zhai sent her a WeChat message: ?
Qu Zhong coldly replied with two words: Avoid suspicion.
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