This was not a case that I was supposed to undertake, but some special encounters made me intervene, and because of its development and changes, I could not forget it for a long Time.
One month in the first half of 1955, one day the old dean called me to say that there was an important task. I walked into the dean’s office and saw the old dean with a serious and heavy expression, and felt something unusual. The old president is a kind and generous elder, always a gentle and kind face, always uncontested with the world. We live together in the courthouse courtyard, I live in a single dormitory, and the old dean only a wall away, usually after dinner or holidays he often come to my room to chat. He was an old revolutionary who joined the Party in 1930 and was the principal of a teacher training school. It is said that he donated his entire Family fortune to revolutionary activities. When the old dean saw me enter the dean’s room that day, he handed me a dossier and a copy of the People’s Daily and said to me, “Look carefully at this dossier and the article in the People’s Daily, and write an inspection report according to the spirit of the article. I was a little surprised to hear that. Then he added, “Write it in the name of the court.”
The cause of the case in the file was written as “major liability accident”, and the case had been closed in 1954. The newspaper article was a mobilization report by Luo Ruiqing, the Minister of Public Security, on the purge of internal counter-revolutionary elements. I understood it as soon as I read it, because I had already read the article. It was a large article that took up the entire second full page, part of which criticized the judiciary for being paralyzed in its thinking, treating counter-revolutionary sabotage cases as ordinary accidents and indulging the enemy in sabotage, and cited a case, the very one I was holding in my hand. A case named and judged by the Minister of Public Security in the People’s Daily, has been “famous” nationwide, naturally a big, important case, not trivial, no wonder the old President’s expression so serious, heavy.
This accident case was in 1953 in Taiyuan Heavy Machinery Factory. The main case is: the plant has a large equipment – 5 tons of steam hammer, said to be Japan’s compensation to our country, has not been put into use. Because the steam hammer is very large, before putting into operation to carry out a trial run, and then trial. Before the test run, the engineer Jiabang drew up an operating procedure, one of which was to add protective pads to the lifting surface of the hammer during the test run, but the test run was not done in accordance with this procedure, and the hammer cracked after the test run, so the whole plan could not be carried out, and the hammer was shelved and could not be put into operation. The plant and the public security department believe that since Fu Jiabang has formulated the operating procedures, he should be held responsible for not adhering to them. According to the value of the hammer itself plus the value that could be created after the production, the economic loss was huge, and it was decided that Fu Jiabang was intentionally sabotaged and sent to the court for processing.
This case was discussed by the trial committee when it was handled by the court, and I still remember it. Most of the speakers at the meeting believed that Fu should be held responsible for not insisting on the implementation of the protocol after it was formulated. However, according to Fu’s defense: Although I developed the operating procedures, but the trial site is not hosted by me, and not my operation, and the steam hammer itself is an old equipment, the cracks found after the trial is extended along the old cracks, even with the addition of protective pads, it is difficult to ensure that the cracks are not extended, should be a natural accident. In addition, the quality of this equipment, the degree of newness, performance and so on are not clear indicators, it is difficult to grasp. The trial committee discussed that Fu was assigned to the plant after graduating from university for a short period of time, lacking work experience and without any signs and motives of engaging in sabotage activities, should be considered negligence, characterized as a major liability accident and sentenced to six years in prison.
After reading the volume I think the court’s treatment is still relatively objective and fair, there is no major problem. However, in accordance with the criticism in the newspaper and the intention of the court leadership, I still wrote an inspection report in accordance with the political thought paralysis that caused the wrong sentence.
In 1955, the court reopened the case in accordance with the spirit of the criticism in the newspaper, and the court added the following reasons: Fu came from a bourgeois family, and his family had been affected by the “Three Anti’s and Five Anti’s” campaign, so he was discontented and hated the government. The death sentence was commuted to a “political accident” of counter-revolutionary destruction.
The facts of an accident case did not change, but first it was a “responsibility accident” of “work error”, and then it became a “political accident” of “intentional sabotage”. Political accident”, 6 years of imprisonment to capital punishment, the difference is also too great. Fortunately, from this case onwards, appeals are allowed for counter-revolutionary cases, giving Fu Jiabang a chance to plead his case. In his appeal, Fu said: “I am only 29 years old, not yet married, in love; although my family is bourgeois, ‘three anti-5 anti’ in some impact, but designated as ‘basic law-abiding households’, did not suffer any losses. What do I hate? I aspire to a better Life, the pursuit of ‘career success’, what reason do I have to destroy my own future? ……” After the trial, the provincial court still treated the case as a political accident and changed it to a life sentence. Finally, through further investigation of the case by the central authorities, the nature of the case remained unchanged and the sentence was changed to 15 years in prison.
Although I wrote an inspection report on the wrong sentence for the initial trial of this case, I was still mentally inclined to the treatment of the initial trial. In fact, not only me, other comrades of the court also share the same feeling, even the old president is no exception. When the court first accepted the case, there were disagreements and arguments with the public security system, after which the public security department expressed its disagreement with the court’s handling of the case. Apparently, the case was reported to the central government by the public security system and was criticized by the Ministry of Public Security by name in the newspaper. At first I did not understand much about the development of this case. As the purge campaign progressed, I came to realize that the case was changing with the changing political winds. Until the “Cultural Revolution” in 1966, the wind was blowing stronger and stronger, and many people were “destroyed” by this wind. And this case is just in time for the beginning of the change of wind direction, hit the wind on the mouth. In fact, this case, regardless of the “characterization”, “sentencing” and in the trial process, there are many questionable points, the court to handle the case with the political wind direction, according to the will of the chief to do, arbitrarily change the trial process, which is the cause of many unjust and false cases over the years This is the root cause of many unjust and false cases over the years.
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