Prosecutors vow to boost efforts in responding to petition letters

Prosecuting departments will attach greater importance to public petition letters and provide timely feedback to solve complaints and major social conflicts, according to the Supreme People's Procuratorate.

"Because people trust the prosecutors, they send letters to us to report their problems," said Zhang Jun, prosecutor general of the SPP. "We should pay attention to every petition case and properly handle them to ensure justice."

He said prosecuting departments should "give their initial replies to petition letters within seven days and give their formal investigation results within three months."

Data provided by the SPP show that from January to September, prosecuting departments across the country received 251,407 petition letters from the public. Among them, 194,262 qualified for a response, and the SPP replied to them all within seven days.

Meanwhile, they have given formal replies to 61,245 petition cases since June, with a reply rate as high as 98.7 percent.

The SPP said most petition letter cases are related to public security departments not filing cases or the courts issuing unfair judgments, which lead people to turn to prosecuting departments to complain and appeal.

Responding to such cases is considered a major step in implementing the policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China to effectively prevent and solve obvious issues and major social conflicts.

"We are placing the public's petition cases as a top priority and are taking feasible measures to increase people's sense of gain, happiness and security," said Xu Xiangchun, director at the SPP's No 10 prosecutorial department.

A typical case occurred in May, when Li Changjie, chairman of a medical instrument manufacturing company in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, contacted the Pukou District People's Procuratorate about a fraud case that had troubled the company for two years.

In 2017, Li hired Zhang Mou as a sales director, and Zhang brought in six men to make up his sales team.

After several months, Li discovered that neither Zhang nor his team had resigned from their former company and were still working there, having fabricated the seals of their resignation certificates.

They cheated Li's company out of high wages, and their deception resulted in great economic losses to the company, according to Li.

Li reported the fraud to the local public security department, but police refused to file the case.

Then in March, Li sent a petition letter to the Pukou District People's Procuratorate about the issue.

The next day, prosecutors met with Li and further examined the evidence.

"After examining the evidence, we think the public security department neglected their duty and should file the case for further investigation," said Wang Zhenxiang, former chief prosecutor of the district procuratorate.

The prosecutors issued a notice to the public security department to file the case, and Zhang and his team members were later detained for alleged fraud.

Li was pleased with the prosecutors' efforts.

"The prosecutors uphold justice and have served the people wholeheartedly to solve our concerns for long time," Li said.

According to the SPP, prosecuting departments will hold more public hearings and invite people from all walks of life to participate.