Kill Fewer, Kill Carefully: Ordinary Chinese are now saying their legal system is medieval, unjust—and too eager to execute suspects

摘要

TEN YEARS AGO, POLICE IN A small village in China's southern Hubei province discovered the mostly decomposed body of an unidentified woman. Local villager She Xianglin had recently reported his wife, Zhang Zaiyu, missing. Zhang's family swore the bodywas hers, and police arrested She and charged him with murder. She, a security guard at a local prison, confessed to the crime—but only after being tortured, he told NEWSWEEK. After a brief trial, a judge sentenced him to death. "I lost hope completely," She says.