Chinese Activist Gets Jail Sentence

A blind activist who drew international attention by exposing China’s harsh family planning policies was sentenced by a court Thursday to four years and three months in prison, the official New China News Agency reported.

Chen Guangcheng was tried last week, without his own attorney present, on charges of damaging property and “organizing a mob to disturb traffic.” He was represented at his two-hour trial by a pair of court-appointed lawyers he had never met.

Chen’s supporters say the case has made a mockery of the Chinese judicial system and serves as a graphic reminder of the government’s strenuous efforts to silence its critics.

“This verdict is highly unfair,” said Xu Zhiyong, Chen’s lead lawyer, who had been detained for 22 hours on theft allegations and was released without charge only after his client’s trial ended Aug. 18. “They’ve lost all reason. They have no respect for the law. We definitely plan to appeal.”

The maximum sentence Chen faced was five years in prison, and his lawyers said they had expected him to receive less than three years, if not a reprieve. The chances of reversing the verdict are seen as slim.

Chen’s supporters say he has become a target of retaliation by officials in the eastern Chinese city of Linyi for publicizing information about forced late-term abortions and sterilization campaigns involving tens of thousands of people.

China’s one-child policy has become less coercive in recent years, and such draconian family planning measures are no longer common practice. But that hasn’t stopped some local officials from continuing with the abuse in order to meet certain quotas.

The harsh treatment of the self-taught lawyer and a recent slew of incidents involving the arrest or intimidation of attorneys fighting against official abuse suggest that the Communist Party is worried about losing control over an increasingly vocal legal community.

The charges that Chen, 35, was convicted of stem from two events this year.

Chen was placed under house arrest last August, and in February of this year, a fight broke out between a villager and one of the many guards watching him. The tiff left the villager bleeding from a head wound. The villager called the police but was arrested, Chen’s eldest brother, Chen Guangfu, said.

The villager’s 80-year-old grandmother went to seek his release, but to no avail, Chen’s brother said. She was so upset that she passed out. Villagers begged officials to take her to the hospital, but they refused. Another scuffle broke out, and another villager was hurt. Authorities refused once again to help the grandmother, and now the other villager, get medical aid.

At that point, angry villagers started smashing the windows of three official vehicles, Chen’s brother said.

“All the villagers know what happened,” the elder Chen said. “It has nothing to do with my brother. But the lawyers are not allowed to go to our village to gather any evidence.”

The second incident took place about a month later.

During the February clash, Chen had slipped into the home of another villager and hidden there for about 20 days. Officials allegedly beat the villager after failing to get him to turn Chen in. In reaction, Chen and about five others attempted to walk to a village official’s office. They were followed by up to 60 guards who tried to stop them.

“They charged my brother with blocking traffic, but most of the people doing the blocking were their own men,” said Chen’s brother, who was one of three family members allowed to attend the trial last week.

The brother said that no one was allowed to speak in Chen’s behalf at the trial and that the two court-appointed lawyers didn’t object to anything the prosecutors said. Chen, he said, repeatedly tried to protest the validity of the trial and threw up several times in court.

“Our lawyers have received death threats, we’ve been arrested and accused of theft,” said Teng Biao, one of Chen’s lawyers. “When we tried to visit the village in July, they turned our car over with two attorneys still inside. The entire village remains sealed off. The phone lines are cut off. They don’t want us to meet or speak to any of the relatives. This verdict today has no legal basis whatsoever.”