Guiding Case No. 6 of the Supreme People's Procuratorate: People v. Luo Jianhua, Luo Jingtian, Zhu Bingcan, and Luo Jinyou for abuse of power

(Guiding Case No. 6 of the Supreme People's Procuratorate)

[Keywords]

Crime of abuse of power, heavy loss, egregious impacts on society

[Key Points]

In accordance with the Criminal Law , the crime of abuse of power refers to a state official's act of abusing power, which causes “heavy loss to the public property or the interests of the state and people.” In practice, where the abuse of power “causes egregious impacts on society,” it should be determined as abuse of power causing “heavy loss to the public property or the interests of the state and people.”

[Relevant Legislation]

Article 397 of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China and the Interpretation by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of Issues Concerning the Subject of a Crime of Malfeasance in Office in the Application of Chapter IX of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China

[Basic Facts]

Defendant Luo Jianhua, male, born in 1963, former enforcement assistant of the Dasha Street law enforcement team of Huangpu Branch of the Comprehensive Enforcement Bureau for Urban Administration of Guangzhou City.

Defendant Luo Jingtian, male, born in 1967, former enforcement assistant of the Dasha Street law enforcement team of Huangpu Branch of the Comprehensive Enforcement Bureau for Urban Administration of Guangzhou City.

Defendant Zhu Bingcan, male, born in 1964, former enforcement assistant of the Dasha Street law enforcement team of Huangpu Branch of the Comprehensive Enforcement Bureau for Urban Administration of Guangzhou City.

Defendant Luo C, male, born in 1987, former enforcement assistant of the Dasha Street law enforcement team of Huangpu Branch of the Comprehensive Enforcement Bureau for Urban Administration of Guangzhou City.

From August 2008 to December 2009, Luo Jianhua, Luo Jingtian, Zhu Bingcan, and Luo C were recruited as enforcement assistants of the Dasha Street law enforcement team of Huangpu Branch of the Comprehensive Enforcement Bureau for Urban Administration of Guangzhou City (“law enforcement team”) by the Dasha Sub-district Office of the People's Government of Huangpu District, Guangzhou City. The duty of the four defendants was to assist in the urban administration of the sub-district, including patrol and participation in routine urban administration of the sub-district and communities; dissuading, preventing, and demanding correction of acts that violate the regulations on urban administration; and cooperating with the comprehensive law enforcement department in carrying out unified enforcement campaigns. Their tasks included a combination of patrol and stakeout and the timely dissuasion of unlawful stalls in central urban areas. From August 2009 to May 2011, Luo Jianhua and Luo Jingtian were respectively the leader and deputy leader of the enforcement assistant team. Later, Luo Jingtian acted as the team leader, and Luo Jianhua as the deputy leader. The team leader was responsible for convening enforcement assistants, allocating road sections during work hours, and checking attendance; and the deputy leader was responsible for assisting the team leader in carrying out daily work and performing the team leader's duty when the team leader was absent. When the four defendants worked, they wore battle fatigues that were uniformly delivered, with red sleeve emblems on the arm, reading “Assistant for Urban Administration of Dasha Street,” and carried a wooden stick. From August 2010 to September 2011, Luo Jianhua, Luo Jingtian, Zhu Bingcan, Luo C, and Luo Huihong(handled in another case), by taking advantage of their positions, solicited cash in small amounts such as 12 yuan, 10 yuan, and 5 yuan and cigarettes from unlicensed vendors many times, or directly took cigarettes from “Shiduo store” located at the road section at the expense of some unlicensed vendors, in exchange for nonperformance of their duty, to permit those that offered them benefits to continue illegal operations at places where unlicensed stalls were prohibited. The acts of the defendants caused serious occupation of streets by unlicensed vendors. There were hundreds of vendors setting up stalls at will, which had severely affected the city appearance and environmental sanitation and brought great inconvenience to the operations, lives, and travels of shops and residents along the streets. They were indifferent to the unlawful operations of vendors that offered money or property to them, and dispersed or notify the urban administration department in order to punish on the site those that did not. The enforcement caused strong resentment from the people, and enforcement officers of the urban administration department encountered violent resistance to public administration in their performance of official duties, and several enforcement officers were injured and hospitalized. The acts of the four defendants severely endangered and affected the social order, economic order, urban administration, and security administration of the region, and caused egregious impacts on society.
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