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China’s top court finds ‘picking quarrels and provoking trouble’ overused
Investigation concludes local officials abuse catch-all criminal offence to prevent aggrieved victims – many of them young migrant workers or unemployed – from complaining to higher authorities.
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- Investigation concludes local officials abuse catch-all criminal offence to prevent aggrieved victims from complaining to higher authorities
- Most charged with the crime are young, and many are migrant workers or unemployed, report finds
The crime of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” has been widely criticised for its vagueness and its potential to be used to muzzle dissent. . Photo: Shutterstock
Investigations by China’s highest court found that local officials abused a controversial clause in the criminal law to prevent aggrieved victims from complaining to higher authorities.
The admission appeared in a field investigation report by the No 4 Criminal Adjudication Tribunal of the Supreme People’s Court, which was published in People’s Court Daily on Wednesday.
The investigation was led by the head of the tribunal, Teng Wei, and was conducted in two cities in the eastern province of Zhejiang and two cities in the southeastern province of Fujian between May and June.
“The charge of ‘picking quarrels and provoking trouble’ is being used widely, and in recent years it has become a trend that it was excessively used,” the investigation report said. “Hence, [it is necessary] to carry out this investigation to ensure proper and accurate application of the law.”
“In the past 10 years, ‘picking quarrels and provoking trouble’ has ranked top among all offences in the rural areas of Zhejiang and Fujian provinces, and most offenders were young people, and many were migrant workers and the unemployed.”
“Many of these cases were about drunkenness and gambling, and ‘picking quarrels and provoking trouble’ was commonly used to criminally charge people who tried to petition [to higher authorities] without following the proper legal channel.”
Through interviews with local judicial and law enforcement officials and residents’ representatives, the investigators found the abuses typically happened because the law was vaguely defined and it was difficult to determine if the petitioners had criminal intent.
The report found there was poor understanding among officials about whether petitioning outside the proper legal channel should fall under “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”, and in some cases offenders who should be dealt with through administrative penalties were pursued under criminal law.
“Based upon these problems [we] uncovered, we recommended that we should strengthen guidance of the adjudication of cases of ‘picking quarrels and provoking trouble’,” it said.
“[We should] give guidance to local courts through judicial explanations and precedent cases so they can apply the law accurately, and cases of picking quarrels and provoking trouble arising from appeals and petitions should be handled with prudence.”
The broadly worded criminal charge of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”, which was first introduced to the criminal code in 1997, has been widely criticised as a “pocket crime” for its vagueness and the potential to be used to muzzle dissent.
Jin Zegang, a law professor at Shanghai’s Tongji University, said the problems described in the report were in fact common nationwide and the analysis it provided helped explain an increase in convictions under the offence in the past 10 years.
“Various law enforcement agencies have turned this crime into a ‘cure-all’ policy tool that can be used to deter potential social ‘troublemakers’,” Jin wrote in a commentary on online news portal ThePaper.cn.
“[If] we are to change the fact that this offence is excessively used, then it is important to prevent it from being used as a political instrument and avoid substituting governing with punishment.”
