The People's Daily reported: "the Supreme People's Court held a court session for the first time to review the death penalty after revoking the power to approve the death penalty."
On the afternoon of June 20 17, the Supreme People's Court held a public hearing in Huanghua City, Hebei Province to hear the case that the defendant Yang Fangzhen was sentenced to death in the second instance. It is reported that this is the first time since June 5438+1 October12007 that the Supreme Court has taken back the power to approve the death penalty. Yang Fangzhen was refused the approval of the death penalty by the Supreme People's Court and was sentenced to death.
How to discuss for an hour in court?
Yang Fangzhen was born in 199 1, a junior high school student from Cangzhou City, Hebei Province. 20 1 1, 1 was arrested on suspicion of robbery. In June this year, he was upheld by the Hebei Provincial High Court and reported to the Supreme People's Court for approval.
Since the Supreme People's Court has taken back the right to approve the death penalty, in similar cases, the judge will also read the case file, go to the crime scene for an inquest, interrogate relevant witnesses and ask investigators for verification. However, even in the influential case of Zhejiang Wu Ying, there was no special court session in the review stage of the death penalty. Both the prosecution and the defense questioned witnesses and expressed their opinions.
On the afternoon of June, 2065438 17, three judges from the Supreme People's Court summoned new witnesses in the court of Huanghua City. Because the criminal procedure law does not clearly stipulate how to hold a court session in the review stage of death penalty, before the court session, the prosecutor asked what procedure to take, and the judge answered with reference to the procedure of first instance and second instance. So, the prosecutor went to ask the leader again, waited for an hour, and the court opened at 3: 30 in the afternoon.
Xie Tongxiang, Yang Fangzhen's defender and a famous Beijing death penalty review lawyer, said that yesterday's trial was mainly witnessed by a new witness, who stated what he knew about Yang Fangzhen's torture. Then the prosecutor, the defender and the judge ask questions respectively, and then the clerk prints out the trial record, which is signed by the witness for confirmation.
Lawyer Xie Tongxiang said that another key witness, Li, would appear in court yesterday, but the local judge could not contact Li, and he did not answer the phone. It is reported that Li reported to the police and testified that Yang Fangzhen carjacked and killed people, but lawyer Xie Tongxiang told the Supreme Court that Li's testimony was contradictory and had major doubts.
As there were still witnesses who did not appear in court, the judge in the Supreme People's Court decided to wait until other witnesses appeared in court.
The prisoners proved that they had been tortured to extract confessions.
Li Moumou, a new witness who appeared in court yesterday (to distinguish witnesses who did not appear in court, hereinafter referred to as Li Moumou), was Yang Fangzhen's cellmate and was sentenced to 9 months in prison for causing minor injuries to others.
Li Moumou was put into the detention center two months earlier than Yang Fangzhen. When he was interrogated, he said that when he was held in the same cell, he saw that Yang Fangzhen was swollen from thigh to foot, and her feet were too swollen to put on slippers. In addition, Li Moumou also saw that Yang Fangzhen's chest and lower back were red and swollen, and there was a scar between the middle finger and the index finger of his right hand. Upon inquiry, Yang Fangzhen claimed that she was beaten by the police during the arraignment.
Regarding the testimony of the new witness, the prosecutor said that there is no evidence to prove that the confession was obtained by torture, and it cannot be determined by evidence alone. As for the medical report proving that Yang Fangzhen had scars, the prosecutor also said that he did not know how the injuries came from.
Yang Fangzhen once wrote a letter to his father describing his suffering. The letter said that as soon as he was taken into the public security bureau, the police electrocuted both his hands with electric batons. After the electric shock swollen, they put the toothbrush between their fingers. There are also policemen who clamp Yang Fangzhen's inner thighs and arms with pliers; Put the tablecloth in Yang Fangzhen's mouth, and then fan his face with your hand; Some policemen beat him on the legs and feet with rubber sticks.
"I didn't rob. I really can't stand it. I don't have a good position now. I'm sorry, I'm a disgrace to my family. I was killed in the public security bureau. Now I just want to honestly beg them not to hit me. As for the death penalty in the future, I also feel much better than in the public security bureau. You have no idea of the pain. Unbearable ... I want to enjoy it now. " In the letter, Yang Fangzhen said.
The prosecution believes that it is not a light sentence.
Lawyer Xie Tongxiang said that in the first and second trial stages, Yang Fangzhen pleaded not guilty, but the defender at that time did the work for him and said that if he pleaded guilty, he would be sentenced to death. Only with a better attitude and positive compensation can he save his life. As a result, Yang Fangzhen, who wanted to save her life first, pleaded guilty at the trial. His father also actively compensated the victim's family for more than 700 thousand yuan and obtained the understanding of the victim's family, but Yang Fangzhen was still sentenced to death.
The first-instance judgment of Cangzhou Intermediate People's Court found that at 6 o'clock on September 6, 2017, Yang Fangzhen rented a taxi driven by the victim Wei and went from Huanghua Port to Huanghua City. On the way back to Huanghua Port that night, he wanted to rob a taxi. When the taxi drove to the vicinity of Qizhuang intersection on the west side of Huanghua toll station of Shihuang Expressway, Yang Fangzhen stabbed Wei's head, neck and chest with a knife for more than 20 times, causing his common carotid artery to rupture and bleed to death. Later, Yang dumped Wei's body in a ditch on the side of the road. Yang Fangzhen was afraid that her crime would be exposed, so she drove the robbed taxi to Haixing County and burned it.
Yang Fangzhen's confession shows that when he was sitting in the back seat and rummaging through the cloth pocket behind the passenger seat, he saw a knife and had the idea of killing the taxi driver and carjacking for fun. Where there were few cars, he lied to the driver that he would get off to relieve himself. As soon as Wei stopped the car, he put his left hand around Wei's forehead and stabbed Wei's right cheek with a knife in his right hand. Wei turned around and grabbed the knife. He stabbed Wei many times, and I don't know where he stabbed him. Anyway, he stabbed him in the upper body. Then, Yang Fangzhen opened the car door again, dragged Wei out of the car, threw him in the ditch on the side of the road, and burned the car afterwards. The next day, he washed all his clothes, dried them and put them on again. As for the watermelon knife used to kill people, he threw it out of the car afterwards.
On-site inspection showed that the deceased Wei had 155 yuan and driver's license in his pocket. There is a 7-meter-long drag mark on the north of the body, which has been dragged to the edge of the road. There is about 1 square meter of blood in the drainage ditch on the east side of the body. Autopsy showed that the deceased had more than 20 wounds on his head, neck, chest, waist and back. The probability of detecting Yang Fangzhen's DNA is more than 99% when a cigarette butt is extracted on the spot.
After being sentenced to death in the first instance, Yang Fangzhen appealed. In the second trial, the Higher People's Court of Hebei Province held that Yang Fangzhen robbed others' property by violent means, causing death. Although his guilty attitude is good, he can compensate the victims for their economic losses and gain their understanding, but it is not enough to be given a lighter punishment. On June 20 13, our court ruled that the appeal was dismissed, the original judgment was upheld, and the Supreme People's Court's death penalty was approved according to law.
Lawyer Xie Tongxiang
Member of the Professional Committee of Criminal Procedure Law of Beijing Lawyers Association, lawyer of Beijing XX Law Firm, specializing in criminal case defense and death penalty review in the Supreme People's Court. Li Youbin's kidnapping death case was sentenced to death in the second instance; The Supreme Court of murder and robbery in AARON Li refused to approve the death penalty, and the execution of the death penalty was suspended for two years; Han Mingkun, the chairman of Beijing Zhongqi Gankun Car Rental Co., Ltd., was acquitted for alleged contract fraud; Liu Qingchun was declared not to have cut down forests.
The national defense law raises many questions.
After Yang Fangzhen was sentenced to death in the final instance, his father went to Xie Tongxiang, the chief lawyer of China Lawyers Judicial Network, and asked him to be the defender of the Supreme People's Court's death penalty review stage. Lawyer Xie Tongxiang checked the case file and went to Hebei twice to meet with Yang Fangzhen, thinking that he was wronged.
"At the meeting, he said that he didn't kill anyone and was wronged." Lawyer Xie Tongxiang said that before the incident, Yang Fangzhen met a man named Hao Ge through witness Li. On the day of the incident, Hao Ge and Li asked Yang Fangzhen to visit Huanghua Port. Hao Ge is sitting in the co-pilot, and Yang Fangzhen and Li are sitting in the back row. On the way, Hao Ge had a dispute with the driver Wei, so he dragged Wei from the car and dragged him into the ditch for more than 20 knives, but Yang Fangzhen never started. After returning to the city, Li called Yang Fangzhen many times and asked for confidentiality. Yang Fangzhen said that such a big thing can't be concealed. I didn't expect Li to call the police and say that Yang Fang really killed someone.
Lawyer Xie Tongxiang submitted a lawyer's opinion to the Supreme People's Court, and raised many doubts about this case: the police extorted a confession by torture seriously, which can be confirmed by letters and witnesses in the same cell; No murder weapon was found, and there was no evidence to prove that Yang Fangzhen's fingerprints were on the murder weapon. You should ask the family of the deceased to see if Wei has the habit of putting a knife in the back seat of the car; Autopsy showed that Wei was stabbed more than 20 times in the neck, chest, back and waist, but how could Yang Fangzhen stab the driver's back and waist with a knife in the back seat? Yang Fangzhen didn't have a drop of blood on her body, and no blood was identified on her clothes. Once the clothes are stained with blood, it is difficult to wash them off completely, so he stabbed people more than 20 times in the narrow space in the car, which is not consistent with his confession. The police did not find Yang Fangzhen's fingerprints and footprints at the scene; The police found five water bottles at the scene, saying that Yang Fangzhen used them to clean the blood on his body, but Yang Fangzhen's fingerprints and footprints were not extracted; The police did not capture the surveillance video of Wei's vehicle passing through the road section, nor did they check whether there were others in the front row of the car; Yang Fangzhen said that it was Hao Ge and Li who killed people. Yang Fangzhen has Hao Ge's phone number in her mobile phone and should be investigated. Li's testimony contains many contradictions and doubts. Especially in his first four transcripts, it was said that Yang Fangzhen was wearing white gloves, and he was wrong for the fifth time. This testimony is not credible.
Lawyer Xie Tongxiang believes that the Criminal Procedure Law clearly stipulates that in sentencing all cases, evidence, investigation and research should be emphasized, and confessions should not be trusted. Only the confession of the defendant has no other evidence, and the defendant cannot be found guilty and punished. But this case lacks a complete and convincing evidence chain.