The situation you mentioned has never happened before. Maybe someone else's lawyer found out, but didn't tell us.
Once a lawyer accepts the entrustment of a criminal suspect or defendant, he is obliged to keep secrets for his client. This is stipulated by national laws and required by lawyers' professional ethics. If a lawyer can't keep the client's secret, then the lawyer has broken the basic bottom line of professional ethics, and no one will trust him in the future. This kind of behavior can also be said that you ruined your job.
It is the responsibility of the police and prosecutors to investigate the criminal responsibility of the parties concerned, not the obligation of lawyers. If lawyers have to bear this responsibility, it is equivalent to canceling the profession of lawyers. The rule of law in this society will disappear.
Some people may say, isn't this shielding criminals? Is there fairness and justice in this?
Yes, no matter what ordinary people think of lawyers and fairness and justice, in the eyes of lawyers, safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of the parties is justice, which is a kind of procedural justice and as important as substantive justice.
There are exceptions to everything. The Criminal Procedure Law stipulates that "defense lawyers have the right to keep confidential the relevant information and information of their clients they know in their practice activities. If a defense lawyer knows that a client or other person is preparing or committing a crime that endangers national security, public safety or seriously endangers the personal safety of others in his practice activities, he shall promptly inform the judicial organ. "
In other words, lawyers only have the obligation to inform the judicial organs of the criminal acts that the client or others are committing or preparing to commit that endanger national security, public safety and seriously endanger the personal safety of others. Lawyers are not obliged to inform the judicial organs of their clients' previous criminal acts.
If the attorney's entrustment is terminated, the parties themselves inadvertently reveal the facts of the case to others, and the lawyer inadvertently learns the truth from others, the lawyer should generally keep a secret. Although the truth of the case was learned only after the termination of the entrusted agency, it was actually related to the practice of criminal defense lawyers. On the one hand, criminals meet because of criminal defense, on the other hand, criminals may entrust criminal defense by themselves, and lawyers cannot be both informants and defenders.
If the defendant's criminal means are cruel and harmful to society, and his escape from legal sanctions is caused by mistakes or crimes in the investigation process, after the verdict is pronounced, the defendant or insider reveals the truth of the case to others, and the lawyer learns the truth from people who have nothing to do with the case, and the lawyer can report the crime anonymously to the relevant departments. If the villains are not eliminated, they may endanger the public one day, and lawyers and their families may also become victims.