Beijing court steps up issuance of judicial opinions to prevent offenses

A Beijing court has recently provided more judicial opinions to government agencies and other entities after solving criminal cases, with the aim of preventing further offenses and advancing the rule of law.

The Beijing No 1 Intermediate People's Court said on Friday that it gave 42 judicial opinions last year to authorities, including public security bureaus and market regulators, as well as enterprises and other entities, up from 19 in 2018.

"We've decided to send more opinions to ask related authorities to strengthen management and inspection because we found that figuring out the reasons or roots of offenses is as important as punishing defendants in maintaining public order and could better prevent similar crimes," said Tan Jinsong, vice-president of the court.

Last year, for example, the court suggested that a market regulator intensify supervision of a vehicle market after a few sellers were given prison terms for blackmail, Zhang Peng, a criminal judge from the court, said.

"The defendants in the motor vehicle market posted fake advertisements for car sales online to attract customers, and then threatened the clients and asked for their money or property," Zhang said. "While solving the case and sentencing the defendants, we also realized that the reason for the crime was a regulatory loophole in the market's administration, so we provided the opinion to the government agency, suggesting it correct the problem."

A campaign by the market regulator increased administrative punishments for those publishing fake promotions, leading to the number of complaints about the automobile market falling to 46 last year from 429 in 2018, he added.

With judicial opinions proving effective in regulating the administrative behavior of government agencies, Tan said the court has also begun sending such suggestions to schools, communities, hospitals and enterprises after solving criminal cases involving such entities.

"What we want is not only to fight offenses by case hearings, but also to prevent crimes and advance law-based governance by explaining legal knowledge to more sectors of society," he said, adding that joint efforts will contribute more to promoting social harmony and stability.