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Li Can, reporter of Chao News Client

The protection of minors has always been an important topic of common concern to the whole society. Whenever a crime case involving minors is exposed, it always touches people's nerves.

Some cases involving minors that have occurred this year, such as the murder of a junior high school student in Handan, Hebei, a knife-wounding incident at a primary school in Guixi, Jiangxi, and the stabbing death of a 15-year-old boy in Suqian, Jiangsu by a 13-year-old boy, have all caused the public to think deeply.

What should we do to ensure that every child can grow up healthily and happily under the sunshine of the rule of law?

During this period, the online drama "Prosecutors of Nine Departments" co-produced by the Film and Television Center of the Supreme People's Procuratorate is currently on the air and directly addresses this serious social issue.

(This article contains only minor spoilers, please read with confidence)

Screenshot of "Nine Prosecutors".

As for the meaning of "九部", the audience who are following the drama must have known it very well - 九部 is the abbreviation of the ninth procuratorial department of the procuratorates in various parts of my country, also known as the "juvenile procuratorial department". And "九部的訴証婦" is the first online drama in my country that focuses on the protection of minors and features juvenile prosecutors as the main characters.

In addition to the "Nine Parts", the protagonists in the play often cue legal terms such as "Juvenile Prosecution Office", "Conditional Non-Prosecution", and "Deputy Principal for Rule of Law". What are the profound connotations behind these "jargons"?

The storyline of the play begins at the end of 2018 and the beginning of 2019. The plot of "the internal organization reform of the procuratorate and the establishment of nine new departments" basically coincides with the actual reform process. The Ninth Procuratorate of the Supreme People's Procuratorate was officially established on January 3, 2019, and then procuratorates in various places successively established the Ninth Procuratorate Department.

Referring to the Ninth Procuratorial Department of the Zhejiang Provincial Procuratorate, its main tasks include punishing crimes against minors in accordance with the law, protecting and rescuing minor victims, punishing and accurately helping and educating minors involved in crimes in accordance with the law, comprehensively protecting the legitimate rights and interests of minors, and preventing crimes involving minors.

It is worth noting that although the "Ninth Department" is a "young" department, its predecessor, the "Office of Prosecution of Minors" (abbreviated as "Minor Prosecution Office"), has, through years of hard work, trained a large number of juvenile prosecutors with rich experience in handling cases involving minors.

The greater significance of "the establishment of nine departments" is that it marks that juvenile justice work has been elevated to an unprecedented level: all juvenile justice prosecutors must devote themselves to the cause of protecting minors with a new attitude and greater strength.

Screenshot of "Nine Prosecutors".

Here we have to mention a concept that is frequently mentioned in the play - the vice president of rule of law.

The so-called deputy principal for rule of law refers to a person who is recommended or appointed by the people's court, people's procuratorate, public security organ, judicial administrative department, and appointed by the education administrative department or the school to serve concurrently as deputy principal in the school.

In reality, the vice-president of rule of law undertakes the indispensable and important tasks of assisting in legal education, student protection, safety management, crime prevention, and governance according to law. In the play, the protagonist, the prosecutor Lei Xu, the new director of the Ninth Department who is accustomed to handling major cases, also had the valuable opportunity to communicate more deeply with many young people after taking this position.

Therefore, we can also see that the drama that has been broadcast has a big highlight, which is not only the specific presentation of various minor-related issues, but also the targeted and proper handling measures of the prosecutors handling the case. For example, rational thinking and in-depth discussions have been carried out on topics such as campus loans, campus bullying, teen smoking, illegal access to children in Internet cafes, unscrupulous institutions inducing minors to undergo plastic surgery, and sexual assault on minors. The corresponding case-handling methods of judicial personnel in the drama can sometimes provide a good reference for reality.

For example, Lei Xu, a new juvenile prosecutor, lacked experience in dealing with minors and did not take into account the psychological endurance of minors. He mistakenly adopted the method of individual questioning and multiple questioning for adults. Only after being reminded by other experienced prosecutors did he gradually adjust his case handling methods.

In fact, the Supreme People's Procuratorate has clear regulations on some standardized case handling procedures, such as the "one-time principle" for questioning underage victims and witnesses. The reason for this is to avoid problems such as poor evidence collection due to improper questioning methods, or "secondary harm" caused by repeated questioning.

Accordingly, the Supreme People's Procuratorate has long implemented a "one-stop" inquiry and assistance mechanism. Currently, many procuratorates across the country have established "one-stop" inquiry and assistance areas with a warm environment, evidence collection, psychological counseling, physical examination, simultaneous audio and video recording, etc.

It must be emphasized that another complexity of cases involving minors is that in many cases, the minors involved in the case include both minor victims and minor suspects. The "protective measures" we refer to for the physical and mental characteristics of minors must be two-way.

The Supreme People's Procuratorate also has this requirement.

On the one hand, for cases where the victims are minors, it is required to pay attention to the methods and approaches of case handling, adopt methods that are suitable for the physical and mental characteristics of the minor victims, and fully protect the legitimate rights and interests of the minor victims; on the other hand, when handling cases involving minors suspected of crimes, the procuratorate should implement the policy of "education, persuasion, and rescue" and the principle of "education as the main and punishment as the auxiliary", with the purpose of helping education and preventing reoffending.

Just like the underage criminal suspect in the drama, he was once granted "conditional non-prosecution" by the procuratorate.

The so-called conditional non-prosecution means that according to Article 282 of the Criminal Procedure Law, for minors suspected of crimes stipulated in Chapter 4, Chapter 5, and Chapter 6 of the Criminal Law, who may be sentenced to imprisonment of not more than one year and meet the conditions for prosecution, but show remorse, the procuratorate may make a decision on conditional non-prosecution.

When making a conditional non-prosecution decision for juvenile offenders who meet the conditions, a probation period of six months to one year needs to be set, and the length of the probation period should be commensurate with the nature, circumstances and subjective malice of the crime committed by the juvenile. During this period, the juvenile who is conditionally non-prosecuted must abide by relevant regulations and receive correction and education as required by the procuratorate.

So we also see in the drama that during the probation period, prosecutors supervise and inspect minors through psychological counseling and other means, keep abreast of their whereabouts and thoughts, and help them out of difficulties.

This process is often not simpler than “resolving it with a lawsuit” or “resolving it with a judgment”.

Some of the "negative cases" presented in the drama are worth paying attention to. For example, parents' inappropriate way of disciplining their children leads to serious psychological problems in minors; cases that are not open to the public are followed up and reported by the media without using pseudonyms, causing minors to suffer from cyberbullying; and minors who seem innocent but actually have complicated minds make false confessions in an attempt to mislead the prosecution...

All these show that the protection of minors is a challenging and responsible undertaking. Every link requires continuous attention and efforts from families, judicial departments and all sectors of society to form a joint force to safeguard the growth of children.

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