The sentencing of former Chongqing police chief Wang Lijun (right) to 15 years in prison is the latest indicator that “the entire legitimacy of the system is crumbling,” says a prominent observer.
Communist party insiders and independent observers believe the high-profile show trial has effectively dashed expectations of legal reform following this year’s leadership transition.
“Lots of inside information from the cases was not made public and everything was politicized,” said Chen Youxi, a leading lawyer who has represented defendants in high-profile cases. “You could say these were ‘open trials with Chinese characteristics’. [These trials] reveal the truth about Chinese justice; they cannot convince the masses.”
A close associate of neo-Maoist Bo Xilai, Wang’s attempted defection to the United States sparked a sequence of events that led to the purging of Bo and shook the ruling elite. But his trial has punctured the hopes of reformist intellectuals that the authorities would use the scandal to introduce new legal reforms.
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