Western and Chinese Legal Traditions (Volume 4)

Author: Zhang Yue
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-12-01
Features: Su San's Release · Interrogation · Traditional Legal Concepts
Su San left Hongtong County, standing before the bustling street,
Her heart heavy before she even spoke,
Listen to my words, kind passersby.
This is a line from the Peking Opera "Su San's Release," a tune familiar to many older Chinese.
Behind these tragic lyrics lies a real and legendary lawsuit from 500 years ago.
It is called real because the characters in the opera are historical figures, and even in the Hongtong County government office in 1918, the case file of Su San was preserved.
It is called legendary because of Su San's bizarre innocence and her dramatic exoneration.
Now, let us revisit this ancient story and briefly analyze the legal implications hidden behind this legendary tale. P373
(1) Su San was a famous courtesan in Beijing during the Zhengde era of the Ming Dynasty, supported by the son of a minister, Wang Jinglong.
Later, Wang returned to his hometown to take the imperial examination, and Su San was sold to Shen Hong, a merchant in Hongtong County, Shanxi.
Shen Hong's wife, Pi Shi, had been having an affair with Zhao Ang and poisoned Shen to death on the day he returned home.
To find a scapegoat, Pi Shi falsely accused Su San of murdering her husband and handed her over to the county government.
The Su San case began here.
The first judge of this case—the County Magistrate of Hongtong, Wang Junliang—immediately accepted the murder complaint.
The second trial was simple: Su San and Pi Shi each other, both claiming the other poisoned their husband.
The magistrate seemed to have no effective investigative methods. Seeing both sides had valid points, he ordered the bailiffs to temporarily detain them in the south prison:
"I will send someone to investigate and."
The two were taken to the south prison. [1]
Once the case was filed, both sides sought influence.
The vulnerable woman Su San, of course, could not bribe, but Pi Shi and Zhao Ang were not idle:
Pi Shi secretly sent messengers to Zhao Ang, urging him to prepare gifts.
Zhao Ang sealed a thousand taels of silver in a jar and presented it to Wang as a gift.
The magistrate accepted it.
With the heavy silver as a counterweight on the scales of justice, the balance naturally tilted.
At the second trial, the judge's attitude changed:
The text describes it as follows:
The next morning, the magistrate rose for court and said,
"I had a dream last night. Shen Hong said: 'I was poisoned by Su San, and it has nothing to do with Pi Shi.'"
As Yu Tangchun was about to defend herself, the magistrate flew into a rage and said,
"Human beings are stubborn; they won't confess unless beaten."
He ordered the bailiffs:
"Beat her until she confesses!"
Yu Tangchun could not endure the torture and said,
"I will confess."
There was no defense, no evidence, no reason at all.
The magistrate, with just a dream, could impose severe punishment.
Between confession and torture, the weak woman Su San had no way to fight back.
The initial trial of the Su San case shows us how an all-powerful official turned an innocent commoner into a murderer, a process that would still chill readers even 500 years later.
(2) If the Su San case had ended there, it would have been forgotten like countless other injustices in history.
A woman who had been a courtesan before becoming a concubine—whose life would anyone care about?
However, Miss Su received special favor from fate.
Her lover, Wang Gongzi, had passed the imperial examination and become the Provincial Inspector of Shanxi—a position equivalent to the "Party Discipline Inspection Commission Head of Shanxi and Acting Provincial Governor," with authority over all officials in the province.
The fate of the Su San case had quietly changed.
Let me explain what "" means.
"" was part of traditional political civilization. If translated simply into modern Chinese, it is similar to the term "" (re-examination), which was very popular in connection with the Liu Yong organized crime case.
According to current theories of litigation law, re-examination is a judicial procedure where a higher court re-examines the effective judgment of a lower court based on its own will.
The rules 500 years ago were remarkably similar:
An unjustly accused prisoner would use various channels to appeal to a higher government office.
If the higher office was moved to intervene, it would take the case file and the prisoner to its own office for review, called "" (review).
During "," the prisoner would be escorted to begin their journey, a process called "." P375