"Raising your hand" pits people and harms themselves Rugao City Procuratorate: admit guilt and accept punishment and pay public welfare damages

A few days ago, the procuratorate of Rugao City, Jiangsu Province, made a decision not to prosecute Zhou X and Xu X, the offenders who infringed on citizens' personal information, and terminated the civil public interest litigation review of 2 people after paying public interest damages. For the co-offender Qiu X, the court filed a public prosecution in accordance with law on suspicion of infringing on citizens' personal information.

Zhou Mou and Xu Mou are salesmen of a mobile business hall, and their daily work is to handle various mobile communication services for customers. One day in 2020, a stranger came to the business hall, claiming to be Qiu Mou. After Qiu chatted with Zhou and Xu for a while, he asked them if they wanted to make a little money, and said that as long as they used the customer's mobile phone number to secretly register an online mall member, they would send them a red envelope of 5 yuan if they successfully registered a member. Although Zhou Mou and Xu Mou felt that this practice was not appropriate, they thought that they could get the red envelope by "raising their hands", so they decided to try it. Subsequently, 2 people registered as members of an online mall without concealing the customer in the process of handling business. Qiu Mou is also very talking about "credit", a single settlement, never in arrears. Zhou mou and Xu mou worked harder under the drive of money, and tried to register more users until they were summoned by the public security organs.

After investigation, Zhou and Xu have illegally profited 2664 yuan and 2535.5 yuan from Qiu. The public security organs then transferred Qiu, Zhou, and Xu to the Rugao City Procuratorate for review and prosecution on suspicion of infringing on citizens' personal information. During the review and prosecution period, the Rugao City Procuratorate filed a civil public interest lawsuit against Zhou and Xu for infringing on the personal information of many citizens.

When questioned by the procurator, Zhou and Xu both expressed remorse and voluntarily admitted guilt and accepted punishment. In view of the fact that Zhou X and Xu X are first-time offenders, the circumstances of the crime are minor, and there are circumstances of confession, admission of guilt and acceptance of punishment, and return of stolen goods, the procurator believes that the 2 people can be treated as relatively non-prosecution. At the same time, in view of the fact that the two persons are willing to pay public interest damages, according to the "Decision of the Standing Committee of the Jiangsu Provincial People's Congress on Strengthening procuratorial public interest litigation work", "for those who have less public interest damage and the offender has paid the public interest damage compensation in full, after a third party assessment or a hearing is confirmed, the civil public interest litigation case may be finally reviewed", on November 16, 2021, the Rugao City Procuratorate held a pre-trial public hearing. People's congress deputies, members of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, people's supervisors, and responsible persons of consumer associations, as hearings, deliberate behind closed doors and fully discuss them after hearing the introduction of the case and the relevant legal basis for filing a criminal attached civil public interest lawsuit.

Finally, the hearing officer unanimously agreed that the procuratorial organ would not prosecute Zhou and Xu, and agreed that the procuratorial organ would terminate the review of the civil public interest litigation after Zhou and Xu paid public interest damages. Zhou X and Xu X paid 2664 yuan and 2535.5 yuan of public welfare damage compensation to the financial escrow public welfare damage compensation account on the spot.

【Source: Jiangsu Provincial Procuratorate_News】