The netizens' most concerned questions in the Tang Lanlan incident have been answered authoritatively.

In 2007, at the age of 14, Tang Lanlan (a pseudonym) was raped in the name of their parents, including relatives, neighbors *** counting more than ten people reported to the judicial authorities, resulting in 11 people were sentenced. Ten years later, the mother of the wrongly accused Tang was released from prison, but has been unable to contact her because of Tang Lanlan's change of name and relocation. Tang's mother turned to the media, so a headline "10 years ago, 14-year-old her sexual assault and other charges to the whole family sent to prison, and then disappeared ......" and a headline "by the whole family of sexual assault of the girl, can not be so lost". Can not be so lost" article on the "surging news" and the "new Beijing newspaper", two reports also cited a number of cases in the evidence of the year in the suspicious place, and will now Tang Lanlan household registration information partially processed after the public. A pile of old cases were thus pushed to the tip of the public opinion.

As a prosecutor, it is impossible to make an objective judgment on whether the case was handled fairly without seeing the original dossier, but what is known about the case contains several legal issues that are worth exploring.

I. Does Tang Lanlan have the right to "lose contact"?

The term "missing" and "disconnected" are used in the Surge News and the New Beijing News respectively regarding the status of the victim Tang Lanlan. Strictly speaking, recognizing a person as "missing" is a legal judgment. China's Civil Procedure Law contains provisions on "declaring a person missing", i.e., if the declared person's whereabouts have been unknown for two years, the court may, upon the written application of an interested party, declare him or her to be a "missing person" after a legal procedure. According to the information in the report, the fact that the victim Tang Lanlan changed her name to move households has been confirmed, only that I have not yet taken the initiative to show up, and does not meet the law on the disappearance of the circumstances of the determination, so cannot be characterized as "missing".

New Beijing News did not use the word "missing", but "lost". "Disconnected" itself is relative in nature, i.e., "a subject has lost contact with another subject". Although it is not a legal concept, it does not mean that it will not have legal consequences. If we want to discuss the question of whether Tang Lanlan has the right to lose contact, we need to discuss it in different situations.

First, Does Tang Lanlan have the right to lose contact with her mother? If we do not consider the other background circumstances of this case, from the perspective of mother-daughter relationship alone, as a biological child, Tang Lanlan's obligation to support her parents is legal, and in the case of having the ability to support, she can not intentionally lose contact with her biological parents out of the intention of refusing to support them. However, this case obviously does not belong to this situation, because as far as the current situation seems to be concerned, the purpose of the mother looking for Tang Lanlan is to understand the case of that year, not to ask Tang Lanlan to support her. Moreover, in this case, the relationship between Tang Lalan and her mother is that of victim and aggressor, and her decision to change her name and move her household registration in order to erase the unpleasant memories is entirely reasonable.

Secondly, does Tang Lanlan have the right to "lose contact" with the media? I think this is a false proposition. Because Tang Lanlan has never contacted the media, not to talk about lost contact. And Tang Lanlan has no obligation to contact the media. From another point of view, let the victims of sexual assault cases repeatedly recall the experience of being victimized itself is to re-victimize people, the media does not have this right.

So who has the right to make Tang Lanlan "reconnect"? If new circumstances do arise in the case that year, resulting in the need for the judiciary to reopen the investigation of the case, then upon summoning by the judiciary, Tang Lanlan must appear. If Tang Lanlan let the judiciary "lose contact" with her at that time, she will certainly bear the corresponding legal consequences.

The details of the case can be disclosed?

People's demand for fairness and justice dictates that we have a desire to know the truth about any judicial case that is exposed by the media. So in the relevant reports, we see some details of the evidence in the case of Tang Lanlan, as well as some of Tang Lanlan's identity information. There are even voices saying that the judiciary should disclose the evidence of the case to the society. However, is it OK to do so?

Network rumors of a whistle-blowing letter handed over to police by Tang Lanlan

Some people may say, "Why not? The case has already had an effective judgment, and the relevant evidence is no longer a secret, and can be fully disclosed to the public." But this is not the case, not all the information of criminal cases can be disclosed to the society, some cases even after the verdict, the details of the relevant evidence can not be disclosed. For example, in criminal cases involving state secrets, personal privacy and minors, even after the entire litigation process is over, the substantive information of the case (especially the identity of the minor parties) must still be kept secret from the public, which is a choice made by the law after weighing the two legal interests, namely the right to privacy and the right to know.

This case is a rape crime case, and the victim was not yet an adult in that year, so it is not a case that can be publicized, either from the point of view of personal privacy or from the point of view of involving minors. Therefore, the disclosure of the details of the evidence of the case to the community is illegal, which constitutes an infringement of Tang Lanlan's right to privacy.

Three, the mother of Tong reversed the case, is it possible?

China's criminal trials implement a "two-trial" system, which means that after a case has been heard by two levels of people's courts, an effective decision should be made. But this does not mean that the effective judgment will not be overturned. The "retrial" system is designed to correct erroneous verdicts, and the mother can only go through this process if she wants to have her case overturned.

However, in order to maintain the res judicata effect of the court's decision, a high threshold has been set by law for the initiation of retrial proceedings. Article 242 of China's Criminal Procedure Law stipulates, "The people's court shall conduct a retrial if the complaint of the parties, their legal representatives or close relatives meets one of the following circumstances: (1) there is new evidence to prove that the facts found by the original judgment or decision are indeed wrong and may affect the conviction and sentence; (2) the evidence on which the conviction and sentence are based is inaccurate or insufficient, and should be excluded in accordance with the law, or the facts of the case are proved to be wrong. be excluded, or there are contradictions between the main evidence proving the facts of the case; (3) the original judgment or ruling is really wrong in applying the law; (4) the proceedings prescribed by law are violated, which may affect a fair trial; (5) the trial judge, when hearing the case, has committed acts of corruption and bribery, favoritism and abuse of the law in adjudicating the case."

From the above provisions, it can be seen that Tang's mother wants to overturn the case, first of all, she has to start the retrial procedure, and in order to start this procedure, she either has to provide the court with new evidence sufficient to overthrow the original effective judgment, or to provide sufficient grounds for believing that the facts of the original judgment are not clear or that the trial procedure is seriously illegal, or that there is corruption and bribery on the part of the trial personnel. If merely expressing dissatisfaction or submitting the same evidence over and over again, I am afraid that such a complaint would hardly meet the standards set by law, and naturally would not cause the retrial procedure to be initiated.

Four, if the case is really wrong, who will take the responsibility?

Finally, let's assume a worst case scenario here: when Tang Lanlan's report was untrue, all the convicted persons were innocent, and this is a wrongful case. If that's the case, who would be responsible for this?

First, of course, is the state. State organs and their staff caused damage to the personal or property rights of citizens, legal persons and other organizations due to the exercise of their functions, and compensation should be given in accordance with the law. Wrong judgment has led to the wrongful prosecution of citizens, the parties can apply for state compensation. Of course, monetary compensation can never fully compensate for the harm caused to the victim by judicial injustice, and minimizing the occurrence of wrongful convictions is the goal that judicial officers are constantly pursuing.

Secondly, should Tang Lanlan be held responsible? According to the provisions of Article 243 of the Criminal Law of China, fabricating facts to falsely accuse and frame others with the intention of subjecting them to criminal prosecution constitutes the crime of falsely accusing and framing. However, at the time of the crime, Tang Lanlan was only 14 years old and was not criminally liable for the crime of making false accusations, so she could not be convicted and punished for the crime of making false accusations. Therefore, even if Tang Lanlan had committed the act of false accusation, she could only be morally condemned.

In the end, I don't want to believe that a young girl in her prime would choose to destroy herself in a way that would plunge those close to her into an abyss of doom. If this was a farce, it eventually evolved into a disaster that no one was spared. I hope that we can be less speculative, more rational, and the parties involved in a quiet space, the responsibility to find out the truth and fair enforcement of the law to the judiciary.