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Chinese lawyers fear cases that turn them into criminals GEOFFREY YORK / Globe And Mail | February 24 2006 BEIJING -- He is one of China's most famous criminal lawyers, but Mo Shaoping does his best to avoid the public spotlight. He knows the rules of survival. He never posts any comments or articles on the Internet. He never signs any petitions. He keeps a deliberately low profile, avoiding any political causes. For a Chinese lawyer, those are just the basic rules for staying out of jail. At a time when dozens of other lawyers have been arrested or persecuted by the Chinese authorities, Mr. Mo has managed to avoid a prison cell. The veteran human-rights lawyer is famed for defending dissidents and accepting sensitive political cases that few will touch. He has been defending political detainees since 1994, and he remains one of only a tiny handful of lawyers who accept such cases. He estimates that as many as 500 lawyers have been arrested in China in recent years, usually on accusations of perjury -- a vaguely defined term that is often used by police after a trial to retaliate against lawyers who thwarted a prosecution. "A lawyer has to have courage to handle criminal cases, especially these sensitive cases," Mr. Mo told a group of foreign correspondents in Beijing this week. "Many lawyers would rather not be involved in criminal cases. The risks are too big." The danger of arrest is already so serious that defendants are often unable to find any lawyer willing to take their case. Even though China now has more than 120,000 lawyers, an estimated 70 per cent of defendants in criminal cases are not represented by lawyers when their cases go to trial, Mr. Mo said. Some of the most prominent lawyers and human-rights defenders in China have been arrested in recent months. Among them is the Beijing lawyer Gao Zhisheng, who has defended members of the banned spiritual movement Falun Gong. Over the past six months, his law licence has been revoked, he has suffered periods of detention and threats from the police, he has been put under police surveillance and his home telephone has been cut off. Mr. Gao and several other activists launched a hunger strike this month to protest a series of beatings and detentions of lawyers and human-rights defenders. Three of Mr. Gao's assistants -- who supported the hunger strike or participated in it -- have been detained for questioning and put under police surveillance. Another lawyer, Zheng Enchong, is serving a three-year prison sentence for "supplying state secrets to foreign entities" after he defended families who were forcibly evicted from their homes to make room for property developments in Shanghai. Even the untrained "barefoot lawyers" who work in small towns and rural regions are often punished. Chen Guangcheng, a blind, self-educated legal adviser in the province of Shandong, and Yang Maodong, a legal adviser in the province of Guangdong, are both confined to their homes under "residential surveillance" today after they challenged the local authorities on disputes in their provinces. Mr. Mo says he often feels an "intangible pressure" during sensitive political cases because he knows that the police are monitoring his movements and making copies of his files. But he insists that he will stubbornly continue his work. "Regardless of the charge, I always believe the defendant is entitled to assistance from a lawyer," he said. "If every lawyer is afraid of the risk, the defendant is deprived of his rights. So I'm not afraid to handle these kinds of cases." Mr. Mo is optimistic about the future, noting the improvements in legal training and legal awareness in China. But the biggest problem today is the lack of independence of China's justice system, he said. The government authorities can easily intervene in judicial cases. "Even when the judge agrees that a defendant should not be guilty, the judge can be influenced by factors outside the court," he said. "In almost every sensitive case, the verdict is guilty. The most I can hope for is a compromise, such as a postponed sentence." ---------------------------------------------------
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