Incensed Chinese Wield Internet Clout to Press for Justice

She was a rich woman driving a silver BMW. They were a peasant and his wife on a rickety tractor hauling a load of market-bound spring onions. Their lives were a universe apart until a sack of scallions got tangled with the side-view mirror of the luxury car.

The outraged BMW driver, witnesses say, leaped out and punched and kicked the couple, screaming, “How can you afford to scratch my car?” A crowd gathered to watch.

The woman got back into her BMW and plowed into the bystanders, killing the farmer’s wife and injuring 12 others.

This is the gist of China’s most famous traffic accident, which happened in the fall in Harbin, a city in the remote northeastern industrial rust belt. Few people outside the immediate area would have heard about it if it were not for the court judgment issued last month against the driver, Su Xiuwen -- a two-year sentence with a three-year suspension, suggesting that she may not spend a day in jail.

In a country with the highest number of executions in the world and where the smallest legal infringement can merit harsh punishment, many Chinese saw the ruling as a slap in the face. The country’s increasingly vocal court of public opinion, incensed that a well-off defendant appeared to be above the law, resounded on the Internet. That online anger prompted traditional media outlets to catch up and follow every development, making it one of the hottest news items in recent memory.

Last weekend, local officials finally bowed to the pressure and vowed to reinvestigate the case for judicial improprieties.

“We’ve received more than 200,000 postings within 10 days. That’s the biggest response we have ever got for a single story,” said Chen Tong, editor-in-chief of China’s largest Internet portal, Sina.com. “The story really touched a nerve with a lot of people because of the stark contrast between the filthy-rich BMW driver and the dirt-poor onion peddler.”

If it were not for that rich symbolism, the incident easily could have gotten lost in a country that is newly in love with the automobile and already too familiar with the price of traffic accidents. Two decades ago, cars were rare and almost everyone pedaled bikes to work. Today, the streets of large cities such as Beijing and Shanghai are virtual parking lots.

The roads also have become more dangerous. China reported more than 660,000 road accidents and 104,000 traffic-related deaths last year. That’s an average of 284 killed daily -- the equivalent of one jumbo jet tumbling from the sky every day.

But no one viewed the “BMW incident,” as it is widely known, as just another accident.

To the people at the scene, it looked as if Su, in a fit of rage, deliberately mowed down the onion peddler. But Su claimed that she had meant to reverse, and that when the car went forward instead, she couldn’t control it.

“What a world we live in,” said one posting on the Internet. “Money can make a ghost come to life. Killing people is no big deal. Why don’t we all hunker down and get rich so we can buy a BMW and kill people for fun?”

The only thing the public found credible was the rumor that Su, 45, the wife of a wealthy businessman, was also related to a high-ranking provincial leader. No one seemed to believe official denials of any such connection.

“In China, it’s impossible to get that rich without some very powerful political background,” said Yang Zhizhu, a librarian in Beijing. “If she was simply a taxi driver, there is no way she could get off that easy.”

Abuse of official privilege -- which enrages regular Chinese like little else -- has helped widen a wealth gap fueled by two decades of rapid economic growth. Much resentment has built up because many of the new rich are perceived to have gotten there through corruption rather than hard work.

“Rich people in China are not like Bill Gates,” Yang said. “They don’t get rich through normal business means. They get rich by ganging up with the people in power. That’s why so many rich people in China are relatives of high-level officials.”

Su’s BMW reportedly is worth $100,000. The vanity plate alone trumpeted her wealth: “6666,” numbers considered good luck in China. Her husband reportedly paid a total of $30,000 to the farmer and the other victims, who suffered broken bones.

According to witness reports, after the BMW rolled over her, Liu Zhongxia, a mother of two, was still clutching her beat-up purse holding small bills that she and her husband had earned selling onions, worth only pennies.

“We’ve been married more than 20 years, and she’s gone just like that,” Liu’s husband, Dai Yiquan, told a Beijing newspaper.

With the growth of the Internet, such cases don’t quietly disappear.

The government was forced to reverse two high-profile cases last year based on outrage from the online community. One involved notorious crime boss Liu Yong. A lower court ruling sparing his life prompted widespread accusations of impropriety, forcing China’s Supreme Court to step in and order Liu’s immediate execution.

The other involved graphic designer Sun Zhigang, who was detained for not carrying a residence permit and was beaten to death while in police custody. Popular uproar prompted the government to abolish a 20-year-old vagrancy law that allowed police to detain migrants at will.

“Without the Internet, these cases would have been buried at sea,” said Sina.com editor Chen. “The Internet’s role will only become more important and powerful in pushing for positive change in society.”

The BMW case inspired a widely circulated online poem dedicated to the victim. It’s called “Are You Just Like My Mother?” Part of it goes like this:

Your life is like my mother’s

Your dignity is like my mother’s

Your suffering is like my mother’s

Your death makes me think

of her

For you,

Let us pray that in heaven there will be no BMWs, nor the need to rise early and sell onions.