Following several cases in which judges were stabbed, besieged or threatened, Chinese courts announced that they would upgrade security measures and tighten their protection of the lives and property of judges and their relatives. But that is not the fundamental solution to violent conflicts between judges and litigants. Experts say the key lies in improving how cases are handled, upholding justice, and rebuilding people's trust in the law and judges.
Liu Tan, mother of a 10-month-old baby, lies in a hospital bed with knife wounds to her breasts. She is haunted still by the nightmare that almost claimed her and three of her colleagues' lives a few days ago.
Liu is a judge at Shiyan Intermediate People's Court in Hubei Province. On the morning of September 9, she was visited at her office by Hu Qinggang, a plaintiff who has been on the losing end of a labor dispute case Liu presided over. Hu, 43, took his chance to vent his dissatisfaction about the result to her.
After Hu argued with her for 10 minutes, he took out a knife he had wrapped in a newspaper, and stabbed her chest. He almost stuck the knife all the way through her chest.
Zheng Fei, the other judge in the office, was stabbed seven times when he attempted to grab the 22-centimeter-long knife. Soon after, Hu stabbed another two judges who rushed to the scene from a neighboring office.
Hu was later seized by court police. Now under detention, he is waiting to be charged for his murder attempt.
The incident occurred just two weeks after 19 court workers were besieged in a coal mining site while trying to enforce a debt dispute verdict in Xiyang county, Shanxi Province. The judges and their vehicles were rescued eight hours later with the help of local public security forces.
In China, especially in recent years, there have been several cases in which judges have been beaten, stabbed, attacked with sulfuric acid or even shot. Some judges have said that they are "dancers on a sharp knife," according to the People's Court Daily.
Legal experts commented that being a judge is now a high-risk profession. One major problem is the lack of trust between judges and the public, and the widespread belief that judges' verdicts are usually decided through bribery.
At a press conference on Monday, the Supreme People's Court pledged to protect the lives and property of judges and their relatives, and to offer them a safe environment to realize judicial independence.
Professional plight
After Liu and her colleagues were stabbed, many judges expressed fear that they might fall victim to disgruntled litigants.
"When being a judge becomes a high-risk job, who can the ordinary people depend on to maintain justice?" a young judge was quoted as saying by Guangzhou Daily.
Threats have become a commonplace feature of some judges' lives, said Liu Cheng (pseudonym), a judge from Shanghai No.1 Intermediate People's Court.
"In our court, although no violence has occurred, our judges have been followed, their home doorbells have been rung strangely, or they have been threatened, either verbally or by e-mail," Liu told the Southern Weekly.
After the judges reported the cases, policemen would at most have a talk with the suspect and give them a warning, media reported.
"But the number of court police is limited. And they can't follow us all day. The public security forces are also limited. So the psychological pressure on judges is always heavy, especially on female judges," Liu said.
In May, in a court in Jinhua, Zhejiang Province, a judge got into a tussle with a litigant who came to complain about a verdict in an equity transfer dispute.
While netizens criticized the judge's behavior, the court revealed in August the results of its initial investigation, which found that the conflict occurred after the litigant threatened to follow the judge to his daughter's school so he could "see what she looked like."
According to a September report published in the Modern Gold Express, a Zhejiang-based newspaper, the judge has been suspended from work and is awaiting the results of a further investigation.
