Justifiable defense protects people's rights

After being held at knifepoint and having his life threatened, a man surnamed Li from Jianghan district in Wuhan, Central China's Hubei province, was later charged with causing intentional injury following his fighting back against his attacker to defend himself, which caused his attacker to be wounded. Over the following two months, the charge was later overturned on the grounds of it being considered justifiable defense.

Rewinding the clock to the evening of June 30 last year, a man surnamed Liu got into a heated argument with fellow players at a mahjong parlor. To prevent further escalation, the parlor's staff persuaded Liu to leave.

The following afternoon, Liu decided to confront the parlor's owner face-to-face to "seek justice".

He first went to a fast-food restaurant across from the parlor and asked the restaurant owner to call someone from the parlor to get them to come and apologize to him while he waited and drank there. However, the restaurant owner was unable to carry out his demands. Losing patience, Liu walked into the restaurant's kitchen, grabbed a kitchen knife and headed toward the parlor.

Upon entering, Liu saw a parlor staff member, Li, squatting at the door. He then held the knife to Li's neck and threatened to kill him. In response, Li used his hands to block the knife and attempted to disarm Liu. The commotion caused chaos in the parlor, and people started fleeing. The struggle between the two spilled outside onto the street.

Li snatched the knife with the help of others and swung it at Liu amid the struggle, causing a laceration and bleeding on Liu's chest. Despite being injured, Liu continued to hurl insults. Eventually, with the intervention of others, the fight was stopped, with nobody calling the police. Li discovered that his neck and fingers had also been injured during the fight.

Three weeks later, in the hope of receiving compensation, Liu reported to the police that he had been hurt and presented a medical report stating that he had sustained minor injuries. After investigation, police officers concluded that Liu was injured during the struggle over the knife and that Li's subsequent defense exceeded the necessary limit, potentially constituting the crime of intentional injury. In August, the case was transferred to the Jianghan district's procuratorate for review and arrest approval.

Prosecutors found from the surveillance video footage from the scene that after taking the knife from the fast-food restaurant, Liu intercepted a passerby riding a scooter near the parlor and waved the knife to drive the rider away. He then used the knife to break the signboard at the entrance of the parlor and randomly selected Li, who was closest to the entrance, as his target. During the struggle over the knife, with the assistance of others, Li managed to snatch the knife and immediately swung his arm, causing Liu's wound.

On Aug 23, prosecutors concluded that Li's actions constituted justifiable defense and thus bore no criminal responsibility, and their explanation was also accepted by the public security organs.

Meanwhile, Liu's actions of wielding a knife, intercepting and threatening others in public places constituted the crime of picking quarrels and provoking trouble. Therefore, the public security organs filed a case to investigate him. Liu was arrested in September, and in January he was sentenced to six months in prison.

The case was mentioned in the Supreme People's Procuratorate's 2023 work report, which was approved by the country's top legislature in March. It stated procuratorates would never compromise on unlawful conduct and pledged to fully implement the system of justifiable defense to protect the legitimate rights of the public.

There was a significant increase in justifiable defense cases last year, with procuratorial organs nationwide deeming 261 people as justifiable defense, representing a 25.5 percent increase compared to 2022.

Luo Qingdong, deputy head of SPP's First Procuratorial Office, said that in recent years, judicial organs have handled a number of justifiable defense cases that have attracted widespread public attention.

China's Criminal Law has a stipulation on justifiable defense, but it has been regarded as a "dormant clause" for some time, due to challenges in interpretation and the influence of misconceptions, such as "whoever is injured or killed is in the right".

Yet, there has been public concern in such cases that has primarily focused on the criteria for determining justifiable defense versus excessive defense.