Belkin, Ira --- "China’s tortuous path toward ending torture in criminal investigations" [2013] ELECD 390; in McConville, Mike; Pils, Eva (eds), "Comparative Perspectives on Criminal Justice in China" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2013) 91

Book Title: Comparative Perspectives on Criminal Justice in China

Editor(s): McConville, Mike; Pils, Eva

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781781955857

Section: Chapter 4

Section Title: China’s tortuous path toward ending torture in criminal investigations

Author(s): Belkin, Ira

Number of pages: 27

Abstract/Description:

On May 21, 2010, Chief Judge Zhang Liyong of the Henan Provincial High Court left his office in the provincial capital of Zhengzhou and travelled to a remote peasant village. There, in front of national television cameras, he bowed deeply three times and personally offered his apologies to Zhao Zuohai, a poor farmer, for his unjust murder conviction (Xinhua Net, 2010). Thus, a ‘month of reflection’ in all of the ‘judicial organs’ – the courts, the prosecutors’ offices and the police of Henan Province – came to a close. This rare public display of contrition by Chinese officialdom was occasioned by this embarrassing case of the Chinese justice system convicting an innocent man of a murder that had never occurred. There was no gainsaying the wrongfulness of the conviction and the innocence of Zhao Zuohai. This was not a case of a guilty party getting off on a technicality.