Tag Archives: Wu Gan

By Yaqiu Wang, published: July 22, 2015

On May 19, rights activist Wu Gan (吴淦), better known for his online name “Super Vulgar Butcher” or the “Butcher” for short, set up two pull-up standees in front of the Jiangxi Province Higher People’s Court. He was there to protest the court’s denial of the defense’s access to files of the “Leping Wrongful Conviction Case” (“乐平冤案”). In May 2002, police arrested four suspects in a case of robbery, rape, and dismemberment that occurred in Leping, Jiangxi province, in 2000. The four confessed under torture and were sentenced to death with a stay of execution. In early November 2011, a suspect in another case claimed responsibility for the crime. In light of the admission, rights lawyers took on the case by representing the four and requesting a retrial, but the Jiangxi Higher Court refused their repeated and lawful request to review the case files. This case, as well as the Nie Shubin case (聂树斌案) and the recently overturned Huugjilt case, are among the typical cases of miscarriage of justice that China’s rights lawyers pursue. Correcting wrongs in China’s faulty judicial system is at best difficult, if not impossible altogether, and rights lawyers have, over time, come to develop methods to put pressure on the courts. On that day, the lawyers for the four victims had already staged a sit-in outside the courthouse for over a week to no avail.

WU GAN IN FRONT OF THE JIANGXI HIGHER COURT ON MAY 19, 2015.

Wu Gan, who works for Beijing Fengrui Law Firm (北京锋锐律师事务所), had messages for the chief justice of the court, Zhang Zhonghou (张忠厚). The poster on Wu Gan’s right was an image of tomb stone for Zhang and a couplet deploring his lack of a righteousness and basic humanity; on his left, the poster announced that the “Butcher” was raising money on behalf of the four victims so that they could bribe the justice for Continue reading →