Protection of judges put at top of agenda
China’s top court has made courtroom safety a priority this year, but judges are also subject to harassment away from work, as Cao Yin reports.
Judge Guo Jie said she felt safer after China’s top court put the protection of judges high on its agenda for this year.
The Supreme People’s Court’s work report, released in March, said 85 judges around the country had died from attacks or overwork in the past five years, and that steps to prevent judges from being influenced or intimidated could not be delayed. It said safety measures need to be strengthened in courts at all levels because a safe work environment is crucial to upholding justice.
“Protection of judicial personnel has rarely been given such a high priority in the top court’s work report, and that deserves applause,” said Guo, from Sanming Intermediate People’s Court in Fujian province. “The move is not only a response to the deaths, but also reassures us.”
Judge Gao Linlin said Changping District People’s Court in Beijing, where she works, increased self-defense training for judges and improved its security equipment after one of her colleagues, 38-year-old Ma Caiyun, was shot dead by two attackers in February 2016.
An investigation found one of the killers had been unhappy with the division of property in a divorce ruling by Ma. The two attackers committed suicide after fleeing to the capital’s Yanqing district.
“As a judge, it’s my duty to interpret laws to help litigants understand my rulings,” Gao said. “But if they disagree with the verdicts, refuse to lodge appeals and try to influence judges, the court should take the initiative to solve it. After all, the safer a workplace is, the better placed it is to push forward the rule of law.”
More courts realized the need for better protection of judges after two attacks in less than a month early last year.
A judge in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region was stabbed to death in late January, and one in Jiangsu province survived after being run down by a car and stabbed in mid-February.
The extremely violent attacks gained the attention of the top judges and in February last year they set up a national committee to make rules to safeguard judges. The top court ordered courts at all levels to establish similar committees.
They have now been set up in 15 provincial-level high people’s courts, including Beijing, Shanghai, Hainan and Gansu, and are being extended to courts at lower levels, according to Xu Jiaxin, head of the top court’s political department.
The committees can give support to judges and should think of ways to ensure their workplaces are safe and free of intimidation, he said, adding, “The damage to judges is harm to the rule of law.”
Although protective policies are being improved in more courts, some political advisers say more is needed, suggesting the country solve the problem through legislation as soon as possible.
More security facilities
Gao said she was shocked when she heard of Ma’s death: “I couldn’t believe such an extremely violent incident happened so close to me.”
She said she felt worried at the same time, as she had also been threatened by litigants before. But she added that her court’s quick response made her feel more at ease.
As a first step, security facilities at the court were improved and patrols of its premises were increased. Then, in March last year, its committee to protect judges was established, in line with the top court’s requirements.
Now, people entering the court building have to pass through multiple security checks, with their identity verified before they are scanned by new detectors that can spot dangerous fluids, the court said.
Meanwhile, every courtroom and corridor in the court building is monitored by high-definition cameras.
“The best thing is that security guards will arrive soon to keep order if we press an emergency button when litigants in a courtroom become too emotional or even attempt to disrupt judges,” said Gao, who specializes in civil cases.
“The upgrading of the security facilities inside our court makes me at least know I’m not alone and that more security staff are standing by if emergencies occur.”
Besides the installation of security equipment, the top court has called for courtrooms to be separated from judges’ offices.
Poor communication
Although security is being improved in more courts, Guo said she still worried about her safety, “because much of the intimidation and influence happens outside”.
She said judges hearing family disputes are the major target of intimidation, “as litigants in such lawsuits are often emotional, which makes it hard for them to accept rulings against them”.
For example, a female litigant kept calling and taunting Guo — who handles divorce and child protection cases — after the judge upheld an original verdict in which the woman’s ex-husband was given custody of their son.
“There was no problem with the ruling found in my review,” Guo said. “The woman had an extramarital relationship and would have found it difficult to afford to raise the child. I explained the reasons to her, but it didn’t work.
“The litigant shouted at me in the calls, telling me female judges should help women. She changed mobile phone numbers many times to disturb me in my spare time, even though I blocked her time and again.”
But Guo said the endless calling was not the worst of the harassment she had received.
“I broke down when I received litigants’ text messages saying they knew my home address and where my son studied,” she said, adding one of her colleagues, a young female judge, was once followed home by a man.
Beijing judge Gao said some harassment could be attributed to poor communication with litigants.
“Communication must be open between judges and litigants, as the interpretation of the law is every judge’s duty,” she said.
She said disturbances sometimes arose because a litigant misunderstood a verdict and the nature of court work, and sometimes when judges were too impatient in their interpretations.
But Gao also said communication needs to be improved between judges and courts, suggesting the committees play a bigger role in thinking of practical ways to head off disruptions.
Courts should take more responsibility when their judges were being influenced, such as increasing communication with litigants and helping alleviate the pressure on judges, she said.
From 2013 to 2017, Chinese courts heard 88.97 million cases, of which 85.98 million were concluded, according to top court’s work report. Yet while the number of disputes around the country is rising, the number of judges is increasing more slowly, with just 120,138 judges nationwide.
Li Yingxin, chief judge of the civil tribunal at Tongzhou District People’s Court in Beijing, said her court filed more than 60,000 cases last year, but it only had 107 judges.
“I handled 464 cases in the past two years,” she said, adding the average number of cases a judge concluded last year was 563.
Guo said she and other judges at her court in Fujian were paying more attention to their health because of increasing work pressure.
“Working overtime in the evening and at weekends is very common,” she said. “Once I didn’t return home until 11:30 pm.” The official workday for judges ends at 5:30 pm.
She added that her court has helped relieve some of the pressure on judges by organizing painting and calligraphy classes.
Gao applauded the Changping court’s reaction to the problems, saying it began providing yoga classes for judges last year to reduce stress levels and also gave them self-defense training, as well as getting other court officials to help interpret rulings.
The court said it had also recruited 40 mediators last year to help its committee improve communication between litigants and judges.
Legislation needed
Xu, from the top court, said in March that more protective policies were being mulled with a view to implementation this year, “because more respect paid to judges better maintains justice”.
He stressed litigants whose behavior was illegal, including attacking judges and damaging their property, must be punished in line with the Criminal Law.
But Dai Hongbing, a political adviser, said in more common cases such as litigants frequently calling judges or following them without violence, where their actions do not qualify as a crime, “we have few effective solutions”.
During the annual sessions of the National People’s Congress and the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in March, Dai, also vice-president of the high people’s court in Guangxi, called on the country to root out the problem by improving legislation.
“We can make a law on court safety or highlight contempt of court as a new crime by revising the Criminal Law, while designing special security insurance for judges may also be effective in alleviating the problem,” he said.
Li Shaoping, the top court’s vice-president, agreed with Dai and proposed moves to safeguard judges through legislation during the sessions.
He said the new committees and current policies were not strong enough to regulate litigants’ behavior, let alone give judges better protection.
The measures are scattered in different rules now and each court has different regulations on the committee, Li said, adding they urgently need to be unified and strengthened in a law.
“A series of problems should also be clarified and regulated, such as what judges should do in their work time, what private information about judges can be disclosed, what security facilities should be installed in court and in what situations judges can be demoted or removed,” he said.
The upgrading of the security facilities inside our court makes me at least know I’m not alone.”
Gao Linlin,
Changping District People’s Court in Beijing
“Working overtime in the evening and at weekends is very common.”
Guo Jie, a judge at Sanming Intermediate People’s Court in Fujian province