White paper: Judicial Transparency of Chinese Courts

II. Disclosure of Trial Process

Disclosing trial process is an important means to provide convenience for the general public to participate in litigation, protect the litigation rights of the parties to cases and satisfy and safeguard the needs and right to information of the general public, as well as a powerful measure to construct the open, dynamic, transparent and convenient judicial mechanism. From case acceptance and registration to service of judgments and verdicts and conciliation statements, the trial activities of a people's court shall be operated on the aboveboard basis.

Establishment of China Judicial Process Information Disclosure Online

In November, 2014, China Judicial Process Information Disclosure Online officially launched, which means a national uniform judicial process information disclosure platform has been built up. By the end of 2015, all 31 high people's courts in China and the Production and Construction Corps Branch of the High People's Court of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region have built up the uniform judicial process information disclosure platform for courts at three levels within their jurisdiction, and established the links to China Judicial Process Information Disclosure Online, thus realizing the full coverage and uniform docking of the information on trials in China. The SPC has provided all kinds of judicial process information and judicial transparency services to the parties concerned and social public on basis of China Judicial Process Online. Through their valid ID cards, cell phone number, inquiry code and password, the parties concerned and their agents ad litem may at any time log in to inquire and download relevant process information and materials and timely understand and supervise the progress of the cases. General public may directly inquire the organization setting, list of judges, litigation guidance, announcement of court session and other information of the SPC through the said website.

In 2015, the SPC completed the transformation and upgrading of China Judicial Process Information Disclosure Online and further enriched the information on judicial process nodes, realized the consultation and download of records of trial and videos of trial, launched the electronic service of judgments, verdicts and conciliation statements, and added such new functions as to contact the judge and enable reporting and complaints filing.

As of the end of December 2016, the China Judicial Process Information Online of the SPC has disclosed the information on trials of 520,000 cases, and published 1,838 announcements of court session, and receives total visits of over 985,000. From its trial opening in August 2014 to the end of 2016, the trial process information of all the 25,509 cases accepted by the SPC have been disclosed to the parties to cases and their agents ad litem, and the number of information disclosure items reaches 525,000, with 33,000 text messages successfully sent.

Courts at all levels have kept optimizing the content and method on the disclosure of information on judicial process, enhanced the high-tech involvement in information disclosure and improved the completeness and convenience for the parties concerned and the social public to obtain information on judicial process. Courts in Fujian have established a judicial information centralized control and management center, which will automatically capture and summarize on a real-time basis all kinds of information systems and relevant statistics analysis data of Fujian Province. Based on such database, the parties concerned and their agents ad litem may log in to inquire information about the details of the judicial process. Courts in Jiangxi have embedded 12368 voice service system and text message system into the online case handling system and comprehensive trial service platform, which has changed passive inquiry into active pushing and realized the notification of any important change in the process nodes to the presiding judge and the parties concerned simultaneously and right after such change by telephone, text message, WeChat and other means. Courts in Jilin have established "e-court" to expand the disclosure channels for disclosure of information on judicial process, and take advantage of the offline electronic display screens, touch screens and phone operator service and online website, text message, telephone voicemail, Weibo, WeChat, mobile APPs and other public channels to form the offline and online full coverage disclosure system. Courts in Jiangsu have elaborated the content of process nodes to cover eight stages including acceptance of case, formation of collegial panel, court session, procedure conversion, change in trial period and close of case, and promoted the whole-process disclosure of information on trials of cases. The Fourth Intermediate People's Court of Chongqing has converted the governmental service website, official Weibo ID, WeChat ID and other litigation service content into 18 QR codes, and the parties concerned may obtain case information and judicial service by simply swiping the QR code.

Promotion of Dematerialization and Networking of Archives and Litigation Materials

The SPC formulated the guidelines on promoting simultaneous production and in-depth application of electronic case files in people's courts, further improving the scope and mechanism of disclosure of electronic case files and enhancing the efforts of disclosure in an all-round way. Based on digital technologies, people's courts have conducted dematerialization of the materials generated in the judicial process such as litigation archives, case files and records of trial, and established electronic files, audios, videos and other digital materials to legally, timely and conveniently make public to the parties concerned and the society. Courts in Shandong have established electronic case files for all cases, and all cases in trial will have entire synchronous audio and video recording. And all electronic case files and court trial recordings are available to the parties to cases for consulting, and information on trial process from the date of acceptance of a case will be disclosed to the parties to such case. Courts in Jiangsu have combined the dematerialization and networking of case files, and timely publish any material that may be disclosed according to the laws when promoting the digitalization of the physical materials to form electronic case files, so that the parties concerned and the lawyers may apply for access to the case files and other materials through internet. The courts in Beijing have entered 380 million pages of litigation files on line, and made available the litigation files on line since July 1, 2016, enabling the parties concerned and their agents ad litem to access, download and print electronic files on line at their homes.

Promotion of the Openness of Case Filing and Litigation Service

Case filing is the first window where a court faces the parties concerned and the general public, and the disclosure content and function thereof keeps expanding and upgrading, and has extended from the single case filing consultancy to the all-around litigation services. People's courts at all levels have generally established the litigation service center, in which electronic touch screens and electronic bulletins, as well as document sample desk and litigation guidance desk are equipped to provide the parties concerned and the public with litigation guideline and litigation risk disclosure letter, as well as case filing information and litigation services.

In order to accommodate themselves to the changes and challenges brought by the reform in registration system, people's courts at all levels have explicitly specified the scope of case filing and the circumstance under which case filing is not registered in accordance with the law, and advocated such measures as notification of rights, risk disclosure and litigation guidance. For cases which shall be accepted according to the laws, the people's courts have been insisting on accepting and dealing with them, and the onsite case filing registration rate exceeds 95%. For cases failing to meet the conditions for case filing, the people's courts shall timely explain to make the parties concerned understand how to exercise the right to sue. The people's courts shall elaborate the provisions on the essential requirements on indictments, prepare indictment sample and provide the parties concerned with demonstration and guidance, and for materials failing to meet relevant provisions in filing a lawsuit, the people's courts shall notify the parties concerned at once and in full.

Many courts have explored the implementation of online case filing and remote case filing. Courts in Jiangsu have provided "integrated" online litigation service, and utilized one window to provide online case filing, online service of litigation documents, online case files consulting, online inquiry, online submission of litigation materials, online interview with the judge, online petition and dozens of other litigation services. Nanjing Intermediate People's Court of Jiangsu Province has launched the "Mobile APP Online Litigation Service Platform" to allow online case filing and service of litigation documents and provide 13 litigation services including information inquiry to facilitate the public to file a case and improve the transparency of the case filing work.

People's courts at all levels are proactively building up the lawyer service platform to provide all-around, personalized and professional litigation services to lawyers. On December 30, 2015, the lawyer service platform of the SPC officially launched to provide online case filing, online case files consulting, case information inquiry, electronic delivery, judge contacting and other services to lawyers. As of the end of 2016, the platform has collected the 21,846 pieces of information about law firms and entered the information of about 88,000 lawyers. The lawyer service platform launched by courts in Shanghai can provide more than 20 services for lawyers including online case filing, online inquiry and automatic avoidance of overlapping of schedule for court session. All the 1,393 law firms in Shanghai are using the platform. As of the end of 2016, the platform has received 1.86 million visits in total, or more than 2,500 visits every day, and accepted online filing of 30,600 cases, with a success rate of online filing of 92.4%, up 4.3% year on year. The lawyers can now complete the case filing without going to the court personally and the formalities for case become more convenient.

Pushing forward the Online Openness of Petition Cases through Letters and Visits

In order to reduce the burden of the peoples to make petitions through letters and visits, enhance the acceptance ratio of the petition cases through letters and visits and reinforce the information disclosure, in February, 2014, the SPC officially launched the Online Platform for Petition Cases through Letters and Visits providing many functions such as online acceptance of petitions, acceptance of complaints, guidelines for petitions, and guidelines on laws and regulations to realize the disclosure of information on petition cases through letters and visits. By now, the platform has more than 32,000 registered users, recorded 7,670 cases and closed 6,232 cases. All local people's courts have enhanced the working mechanism towards petition cases through letters and visits, and proactively promoted the disclosure of information on petition cases through letters and visits, by creating professional online platform for petition cases through letters and visits, setting up module for petition cases through letters and visits on the judicial transparency website and other means. Courts in Hubei, Hunan, Gansu have carried out online acceptance and online reply for petition cases by dedicated online platform for petition cases through letters and visits.

Promotion of Hearing Disclosure

The promotion of hearing disclosure is an important measure to guarantee the people to participate in judicial activities and supervise judicial work. People's courts at all levels shall deepen the hearing disclosure of cases involving national compensation, objection to jurisdiction, probation, retrial, commutation and parole, or objection to enforcement, and expand the hearing subjects, improve the hearing procedures and enhance the publicity and transparency. By bulletins, websites, Weibo and other platforms, courts in Gansu have timely disclosed to the society the cause, time, place and members of collegial panel of the hearing and notified the rights, obligations and other contents of the participants to the hearing, invited NPC members, CPPCC members, people's procuratorates, people's mediation organizations and relevant departmental staff to participate in hearing. In 2014, the retrial examination hearing rate of courts in Gansu Province reached 24.33%. Courts in Guangdong Province have carried out over 1,000 various public hearings since 2013, and the commutation case hearing rate reached 100%. Courts in Jilin have opened hearing disclosure column on their judicial transparency websites, which enables the public to check all kinds of hearing information on a real-time basis and make online application for attending case trials as observers.

Development of the Disclosure of Commutation, Parole and Serving Sentence outside Prison Temporarily

Implementing the disclosure system for cases of commutation, parole, and serving sentence outside prison temporarily is an important measure to strengthen the judicial human right guarantee, promote the disclosure and impartiality of the criminal punishment enforcement and realize the community correction function of the criminal punishment. The SPC has launched the website of disclosure of information on commutation, parole or serving sentence outside prison temporarily adjudicated by courts in China, to ensure the disclosure and impartiality of the cases of commutation, parole or serving sentence outside prison temporarily. People's courts at all levels shall make greater efforts in the disclosure of cases of commutation, parole and serving sentence outside prison temporarily in accordance with the requirements of "Five Alls" (i.e. For all cases of commutation, parole and serving sentence outside prison temporarily, the commutation or parole recommendation or the application for serving sentence outside prison temporarily and other materials shall be legally disclosed to the general public after such cases are registered; for all cases of commutation or parole of criminals committed duty-related crimes, organized crimes related to gangs and financial crimes, such cases shall be legally heard in public; for all public hearing of cases of commutation or parole of criminals committed duty-related crimes, organized crimes related to gangs and financial crimes, NPC members, CPPCC members or relevant representatives shall be invited to attend the court trial; for all judgments, verdicts and conciliation statements of the cases of commutation, parole or serving sentence outside prison temporarily, they shall be legally disclosed on China Judgments Online; and for all personnel of the courts who have acted against discipline or laws, or even constituted a crime during his/her handling of the cases of commutation, parole and serving sentence outside prison temporarily, they shall be legally investigated liabilities and given heavier punishment for that.) The public trial rate of Commutation cases tried and closed in Courts in Guangdong in total from 2014 till nowreaches 100% and all of them have been disclosed online. Relying on information means, courts in Fujian have launched the commutation and parole cases disclosure and publishing system, and the parties concerned and the general public may search and inquire information on commutation and parole by entering into the case number, name of criminal and the name of crime.

All local people's courts shall proactively promote the construction of the commutation and parole working mechanism to take digital courts within prison as their focuses, in order to enhance the trial transparency of commutation and parole cases. Hebei Hengshui Intermediate People's Court has used technological court within prisons to greatly promote the disclosure and transparency of commutation and parole, and the parole case trial rate and the commutation case trial rate (for corruption and malfeasance cases with high social concerns) have both reached 100%. Courts in Jiangsu and the Jiangsu Bureau of Prisons have jointly promoted the construction of the remote court session system for commutation and parole cases, explored remote court trial and remote attendance as observer, and widely accepted external supervision. Jiangsu Xuzhou Intermediate People's Court has established the working mechanism of "accompanying by judge, inspecting with records, making checks at all levels, and enabling social supervision and regular announcement" for cases of serving sentence outside prison temporarily, and invited the people's procuratorate, NPC members and CPPCC members to carry out valid supervision over the cases of serving sentence outside prison temporarily, in order to enhance the transparency of the examination over severing sentence outside prison temporarily.

Strengthening the Disclosure of Information on Adjudicative Committee

The reform in the system of adjudicative committee has been promoted to strengthen the transparency of the work of the adjudicative committee. The judicial interpretations, normative documents and other information discussed and adopted by the SPC Adjudicative Committee will be timely disclosed to the public by its official website, Weibo and mobile TV on the same day. The SPC also invites NPC members, CPPCC members and experts and scholars to attend the meeting of the adjudicative committee to seriously hear their opinions and suggestions.

Enhancement of the Disclosure of Information on Bankruptcy Reorganization Cases

On July 27, 2016, the SPC printed and distributed the Regulations on Information Disclosure of Enterprise Bankruptcy Cases, to regulate the information disclosure of enterprise bankruptcy cases. On August 1, 2016, the Information Website of National Enterprise Bankruptcy Reorganization Cases has been officially launched. The Information Website consists of three parts, namely, the information internet of national enterprise bankruptcy reorganization cases, work platform for judges of enterprise bankruptcy cases, and work platform for bankruptcy administrators, of which, the information internet of national enterprise bankruptcy reorganization cases is an internet information website that publishes all kinds of information on bankruptcy cases by classification in accordance with the principle of full disclosure of the case process, and the investors can obtain the information and status of the debtor enterprises of relevant cases in the column of information disclosure of debtors, and may publish investment demands, subscribe dynamic information on debtor enterprises, and carry out interactive communication with the bankruptcy administrator and other activities through the website. Creditors, debtors and contributors as well as other relevant case subjects may legally exercise relevant rights provided by the Bankruptcy Law through the website, and make appointment for case filing, declaration for creditor's rights, submission of objection application, participation in the meeting of the creditors, voting and conducting other online activities.