Recently, Ms. Wang of Chongqing Zhongxian County sold 150 bowls of cooked meat and was reported and filed a lawsuit by Shao Baichun, a professional counterfeiter, and the Chongqing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court finally ruled for a total of nearly 50,000 yuan in compensation. This case has aroused widespread discussion and controversy at home and abroad, and the social phenomenon of "professional counterfeiting" has once again appeared in the center of public opinion.
Professional counterfeiters are those who know that they are buying fakes and making claims based on them, and after Article 49 of the Consumer Rights and Interests Protection Law promulgated in 1994 stipulates a compensation system for fraudulent acts of business operators that "refund one for one compensation", professional counterfeiters are born. The Food Safety Law will legislate the "buy one for ten" legislation, stipulating that "in addition to claiming compensation for losses, consumers may also request compensation from producers or operators to pay ten times the price or three times the loss; if the amount of additional compensation is less than 1,000 yuan, it is 1,000 yuan". Article 3 of the Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Food and Drug Dispute Cases clearly stipulates that "where a dispute arises over the quality of food or drugs, and the purchaser claims rights against the producer or seller, and the producer or seller defends the purchase on the grounds that the purchaser knows that there are quality problems in the food or drug, the people's court will not support it." The promulgation of the above-mentioned laws and judicial interpretations has objectively promoted the number of professional counterfeiters to enter a peak.
Regarding the fight against professional counterfeiting, the core of the discussion between the legal profession and the public has pointed to the issue of the legitimacy of professional counterfeiting. The law protects the legitimate rights of consumers, but the professional counterfeiting obviously uses punitive damages as a tool for profit, if the purpose of making profits to protect rights becomes an industrial chain, the normal rights protection ecology and market environment will be seriously damaged, which is also contrary to the original intention of consumer protection laws and regulations, constituting the phenomenon that the dragon slayer itself has become a dragon.
This report is based on the case data of Chongqing courts on food safety, in order to discover the characteristics and trends of occupational counterfeiting, and provide materials and perspectives for the study of the phenomenon of occupational counterfeiting.
Sources and methods of retrieving data:
1. Database: Wolters Kluwer's First Legal Information Base (wkinfo.com.cn)
2. Sample search time: January 1, 2017 - December 31, 2021
3. Search options and keywords: "last 5 years", "food safety", "first instance", "tort liability dispute", "judgment".
Note: (1) In order to ensure the authenticity of the sample, 50 cases of Wolters Kluwer were randomly selected and compared with the cases of the judgment document network, and the judgment results were completely consistent.
(2) This report mainly focuses on the problem of occupational counterfeiting in food safety cases, and based on different search methods and databases, the number of case searches may be inconsistent.
First, macro data analysis
(1) Analysis of the number of cases
Searched by the above-mentioned search method, there are a total of 18,167 first-instance judgment results nationwide, as shown in the following chart:
Among them, from 2017 to December 2021, the total number of cases in Chongqing that were judged to return and compensate for food safety was 10,648, accounting for 59.08% of the national total, ranking first in the country and 9,049 more than guangdong province, which ranked second. It can be seen that Chongqing is a key area for food safety rights protection to crack down on counterfeiting.
(2) Analysis of judicial support rates
In order to further analyze, the research group counted the judgment results of the above 18167 search results in the whole country and the top ten provinces and cities:
The chart shows that the first-instance support/partial support of the national court system accounted for 77.79%, the total number of cases was 14132, the total number of cases rejected in the first instance accounted for 21.43%, and the total number of cases was 3893, which was generally partial to the attitude of support.
1. The cities with the highest success rates are Tianjin and Chongqing. In food infringement cases, Tianjin won the first instance with a 92.51%, ranking first. In the past five years, the total number of cases in Tianjin has been 668, and 618 food safety infringement cases have been fully or partially supported by the court. Chongqing's first-instance success rate was 83.41%, accounting for the second place in the country. In Chongqing, 8,881 food safety infringement cases were fully or partially supported, and 1,372 food infringement cases were rejected by the court.
2. The lowest success rates were in Fujian and Beijing, with 17.14% and 32.95% respectively. Fujian Province and Beijing Municipality accounted for the largest proportion of all rejections of litigation claims in the first instance, 82.63% and 66.67% respectively, about 352 such cases in Fujian Province rejected all first-instance litigation claims, and about 176 in Beijing.
In summary, from the macro data point of view, Chongqing is at the forefront of the country in terms of the absolute number of cases and the success rate of lawsuits.
(3) Counterfeiters from other places pouring into Chongqing to crack down on counterfeiting
The search results of adding a qualifier "live in Chongqing City" to the plaintiff's conditions of the above search were 6177, accounting for 57.8% of the total case volume, which shows that a large number of professional counterfeiters from other places have poured into Chongqing to carry out "anti-counterfeiting activities". Based on the above-mentioned winning rate and absolute number of cases in Chongqing, there is reason to believe that the reason for the influx of counterfeiters from other places into Chongqing to fight counterfeiting is to benefit from the support of the judicial environment.
Second, micro-data analysis: the characteristics of professional counterfeiters in Chongqing
In order to objectively analyze the characteristics of this group, this report also conducts corresponding searches based on the above search data by: (1) setting qualifiers in the search options; (2) selecting plaintiffs with a high prosecution rate as keywords for a special search, while searching the relationship between different plaintiffs in the judgment; and (3) accumulating the amount of winning cases for specific counterfeiters. Through this method, this report finds that professional counterfeiters in Chongqing have the following characteristics: (In particular, due to the limitation of data and retrieval methods, this report cannot guarantee the accuracy of the conclusions, and only statistically analyzes the objectively reflected data.) ）
(1) Familyization of professional counterfeiters
Through the search, it was found that the family characteristics of professional counterfeiters in Chongqing are obvious, mainly husband and wife, accompanied by father-son, mother-child relationship, and mainly the following representative families:
1. Luo Wei family
There were 820 cases of further searching using "Luo Wei" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 444 were myself and 390 were litigation agents, serving as agents of Luo Shenghua and Sun Guilan respectively. Randomly select a judgment to analyze social relations, the judgment indicates that Luo Wei and Luo Shenghua are father-son relationships, and Luo Wei and Sun Guilan are mother-son relationships. Further searching with this clue, there were 192 lawsuits filed with "Luo Shenghua" as the plaintiff, and 181 lawsuits with "Sun Guilan" as the plaintiff. In summary, the Luowei family actually filed 817 food safety lawsuits.
Luo Wei family's food safety rights protection cases cover many jurisdictions in Chongqing, and their case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the following figure, accounting for 98% of the total cases, and 95% of the total/partial support of the first instance, and 5% of the rejection of all litigation claims in the first instance. Judging from the trial results, of the 817 cases retrieved with "Luo Wei" as the keyword, about 98% of them were concluded within 30 days.
In summary, Luo Wei's family conducted litigation in Chongqing to crack down on counterfeiting and profit 830875 yuan.
2. Cui Yi family
There were 549 cases further searched using "Cui Yi" as the plaintiff's keyword. Among them, Cui Yi himself had 341 cases, and the remaining 208 cases served as Li Jihong's agents. A random judgment was selected to analyze social relations, which stated that Cui Yi and Li Jihong were husband and wife. Using "Li Jihong" as the keyword for further searching, there were 208 lawsuits filed with him as the plaintiff.
As shown in the figure below, nearly 80% of cases are concluded within 30 days, and 96.47% of cases are fully/partially supported in the first instance. According to the calculation of 341 lawsuits filed with Cui Yi himself as the plaintiff, the profit from the litigation with Cui Yi as the plaintiff is 418174 yuan.
Li Jihong's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, and 96.71% of the first instance is fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 208 lawsuits filed by Li Jihong himself as the plaintiff, Li Jihong made a profit of 189,000 yuan for the plaintiffs.
In summary, Cui Yi and Li Jihong conducted litigation in Chongqing to crack down on counterfeiting and profited 607174 yuan.
3. Hu Yubao family
There were 508 cases with "Hu Yubao" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 481 cases had Hu Yubao himself as the plaintiff. The judgment stated that Hu Yubao and Xu Mengchen were husband and wife, and a total of 27 cases were searched with "Xu Mengchen" as the keyword, of which 27 were filed by myself.
Hu Yubao's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, about 63% of the cases were concluded within 30 days, and 97.77% of the cases were fully/partially supported in the first instance. According to the calculation of 481 lawsuits filed by Hu Yubao himself as the plaintiff, Hu Yubao's lawsuits have profited 1961528 yuan.
The completion cycle and judgment results of Xu Mengchen's case are shown in the following figure, all 27 cases were concluded within 15 days, and 96.3% of the total/partial support of the first instance was accounted for. It is worth noting that Xu Mengchen's 5 successful judgments refunded the amount of 754880 yuan, and the total profit was 774880 yuan.
In summary, Hu Yubao and Xu Mengchen conducted litigation in Chongqing to crack down on counterfeiting and profited 2736408 yuan.
4. Li Zhanjiang family
A total of 447 cases were searched using "Li Zhanjiang" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 390 were conducted by Li Zhanjiang himself, and the remaining 57 cases were appointed as Peng Xuelian's entrusted litigation agents. The judgment states that Li Zhanjiang and Peng Xuelian are husband and wife, and there are 57 cases of further searching with "Peng Xuelian" as the plaintiff's keyword, all of which are personal.
Li Zhanjiang's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, about 57% of the trial was completed within 30 days, and 86.67% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 390 lawsuits, Li Zhanjiang made 541622 yuan in profits for the plaintiff to file a lawsuit.
Peng Xuelian's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, about 67% of the trials were completed within 30 days, and 94.74% of the first-instance trials were fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 57 lawsuits, Peng Xuelian made a profit of 53,000 yuan for the plaintiffs to file a lawsuit.
In summary, Li Zhanjiang and Peng Xuelian and their wife conducted litigation in Chongqing to crack down on counterfeiting and profited 594622 yuan.
(2) Professional counterfeiters huddled together
Through the search, it was found that the characteristics of professional counterfeiters in Chongqing were obvious, mainly manifested as mutual agency and group fighting.
1. Group analysis
A total of 551 cases were searched using "Hu Yong" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 468 were Hu Yong himself, and the rest served as the entrusted litigation agents of Li Juan, Hu Tao, Yin Qing, Du Wenjiang and Peng Yuzhi.
There were 387 results in the search using "Li Juan" as the keyword, of which 327 were the plaintiffs. The verdict states that Li Juan is Hu Yong's wife. There were 106 searches using "Hu Tao" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 104 were conducted by Hu Tao himself. A total of 122 searches were conducted with "Yin Qing" as the plaintiff's keyword, including 114 by Yin Qing himself; 119 were searched with "Peng Yuzhi" as the plaintiff's keyword, including 113 by Peng Yuzhi himself; and 397 were searched with "Du Wenjiang" as the plaintiff's keyword, including 392 by Du Wenjiang himself.
Through the search, it was found that the above six people were entrusted as agents ad litem agents in multiple cases, and had the performance of cracking down on counterfeiting in groups, with a total of 1461 lawsuits filed.
2. Litigation and profit analysis
Hu Yong's case completion cycle and judgment results shown in the following figure, nearly 72% of the 551 cases were concluded within 30 days, and the proportion of all/part support in the first instance was 69.33%. According to the calculation of 468 lawsuits filed by Hu Yong himself as the plaintiff, Hu Yong's lawsuits have profited 1033827 yuan.
Li Juan's case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the figure below, about 76% of the 387 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 88.11% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 327 lawsuits filed by Li Juan herself as the plaintiff, Li Juan's litigation profits 401528 yuan.
Hu Tao's case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the following figure, all 106 cases were concluded within 2-15 days, and 86,79% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 104 lawsuits filed by Hu Tao himself as the plaintiff, Hu Tao's litigation profits 139761 yuan.
Yin Qing's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure: 40% of the 122 cases were concluded on the same day, 60% were concluded within 2-15 days, and 87.7% of the first-instance trials were fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 114 lawsuits filed by Yin Qing himself as the plaintiff, Yin Qing's litigation profits 187461 yuan.
Peng Yuzhi's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, all 119 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 81.51% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 113 lawsuits filed by Peng Yuzhi himself as the plaintiff, Peng Yuzhi filed a lawsuit for a profit of 97,430 yuan.
Du Wenjiang's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, all 397 cases were concluded within 90 days, and 83.12% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 392 lawsuits filed by Du Wenjiang himself as the plaintiff, Du Wenjiang made a profit of 534649 yuan in litigation.
In summary, Hu Yong, Li Juan, Hu Tao, Yin Qing, Du Wenjiang, and Peng Yuzhi filed a lawsuit in Chongqing and profited 2394656 yuan.
(3) Corporatization of professional counterfeiters
1. Corporatization analysis
In the search process, it was found that the names of Jia Wei, Jia Long, Jia Tao and other names were highly correlated. There were 303 cases in which "Jia Wei" was selected as the plaintiff's keyword for search, of which 276 were plaintiffs, and the rest were entrusted litigation agents for others. There were 602 cases in which "Jia Long" was selected as the plaintiff's keyword for search, of which 523 were the plaintiffs, and 131 cases were searched by "Jia Tao" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 92 were plaintiffs. The judgment states that Jia Wei, Jia Long, and Jia Tao are brothers, and the three of them are Deng Debo, Wang Weihua, Yang Li, Chen Yaping, Liu Wang, and others who serve as entrusted litigation agents.
There were 208 searches with "Deng Debo" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 207 were the plaintiff; 155 were searched with "Wang Weihua" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 135 were the plaintiff; 80 were searched with "Yang Li" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 57 were the plaintiff; 342 were searched with "Chen Yaping" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 335 were the plaintiff; and 120 were searched with "Liu Wang" as the plaintiff's keyword, of which 106 were the plaintiff.
According to the judgment, Jia Wei, Jia Long, Jia Tao, Deng Debo, Wang Weihua, Yang Li, Chen Yaping and Liu Wang, who are acting as agents of each other, are all employees of Chengdu Mimi Obedient Trading Co., Ltd. After inquiring about the industrial and commercial registration, Chen Yaping is a sole shareholder, executive director and legal representative of Chengdu Mimi Obedient Trading Co., Ltd. They served each other as agents ad litem in a number of cases and participated in the proceedings on the grounds of "being appointed by the company" in the judgment.
2. Litigation and profit analysis
Among them, Jia Wei's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, about 88% of the 303 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 98.57% of the first-instance trial was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 276 lawsuits filed by Jia Wei himself as the plaintiff, Jia Wei profited 394343 yuan.
Jia Long's case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the following figure, about 56% of the 602 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 83.37% of the first-instance trials were fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 523 lawsuits filed by Jia Long himself as the plaintiff, Jia Long made a profit of 1961115.6 yuan.
Jia Tao's case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the following figure, about 75% of the 131 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 85.87% of the first-instance trial was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 92 lawsuits filed by Jia Tao himself as the plaintiff, Jia Tao made a profit of 117,152.6 yuan.
Deng Debo's case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the following figure, about 46% of the 208 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 90.34% of the first-instance trials were fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 207 lawsuits filed by Deng Debo himself as the plaintiff, Deng Debo profited 980088 yuan.
Wang Weihua's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the following figure, about 79.01% of the 155 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 94.81% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 135 lawsuits filed by Wang Weihua himself as the plaintiff, Wang Weihua profited 142076 yuan.
The result of Yang Li's case adjudication is shown in the figure below, and 96.55% of the 80 cases were fully/partially supported in the first instance. According to the calculation of 57 lawsuits filed by Yang Li herself as the plaintiff, Yang Li made a profit of 88397 yuan.
Chen Yaping's case completion cycle and judgment results are shown in the figure below, about 97% of the 342 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 86.87% of the first instance was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 335 lawsuits filed by Chen Yaping himself as the plaintiff, Chen Yaping's profit 518925 yuan.
Liu Wang's case completion cycle and adjudication results are shown in the figure below, about 50% of the 120 cases were concluded within 30 days, and 100% of the first-instance trial was fully/partially supported. According to the calculation of 106 lawsuits filed by Liu Wang himself as the plaintiff, Liu Wang's profit 125266 yuan.
In summary, Jia Wei and others made a profit of 4327362 yuan in Chongqing in the corporatization of counterfeiting.
(4) Summary and evaluation
1. Chongqing's anti-counterfeiters have the tendency of familyization, grouping and corporatization
Through the above case analysis, it can be seen that in the Chongqing food safety infringement compensation case, the parties are extremely related, and there is a trend of family, group and corporatization.
There are 8 families in Chongqing that are clearly cracking down on counterfeiting as a family unit, namely Luo Wei and his parents Luo Shenghua and Sun Guilan (hereinafter referred to as the "Luo family"), Li Zhanjiang and Peng Xuemei (hereinafter referred to as the "Peng family"), Li Liang and his wife and son, namely Liu Chunxue and Li Yang (hereinafter referred to as the "Li family"), Cui Yi and Li Jihong (hereinafter referred to as the "Cui family"), Li Hongyan and Han Wenjing (hereinafter referred to as the "Han family"), Hu Yubao and Xu Mengchen (hereinafter referred to as the "Hu family"), Zhang Pei and his parents Zhang Guoxiao, Gong Guanglan (hereinafter referred to as "ZhangJia"), Zhou Kaili and Zhou Kaixin brothers (hereinafter referred to as "Zhou Family").
There are three groups with significant anti-counterfeiting groups and companies in Chongqing, namely the group composed of Hu Yong, Li Juan, Hu Tao, Yin Qing, Peng Yuzhi and Du Wenjiang (hereinafter referred to as "Hu Tuan"), the group composed of Jia Wei, Jia Long, Jia Tao, Deng Debo, Wang Weihua, Yang Li, Chen Yaping and Liu Wang, members of Chengdu Mimi Obedient Trading Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Mimi Gong"),and the group composed of Qin Dong, Yan Yong, Liu Nashu, Chen Tianqing and Chen Jing (hereinafter referred to as "Qin Tuan").
The number and proportion of the above lawsuits are shown in the following figure:
It can be seen that the 8 groups of families who filed lawsuits have filed a total of 2782 food safety tort liability lawsuits, accounting for 26.12% of the total number of such lawsuits in Chongqing, and 3311 such lawsuits have been filed by groups composed of more than 3 people, accounting for 31.3% of the total number of such lawsuits in Chongqing. The above 13 typical anti-counterfeiting groups filed a total of 6,092 such lawsuits, accounting for 57.42% of the total.
In addition, according to the statistics of the search results, there are more than 10 people who have filed more than 50 litigation cases by a single individual, and the total number of lawsuits filed by these ten people is about 1200.
The food safety tort liability cases filed by the above 13 typical anti-counterfeiting groups and individuals who have filed more than 50 lawsuits account for about 70% of such cases in Chongqing.
2. Counterfeiters make a lot of profits through litigation to crack down on counterfeiting
After the statistics of more than 50 cases of counterfeiters, professional counterfeiters have made a lot of profits in Chongqing, the most of which is Mimi Obedient Company, with a profit of 4327362 yuan. The following table counts the amount of profits made by professional counterfeiters (Note: The relevant amount is only a rough statistic, for reference only):
| Name/Abbreviation | Opportunity Quantity/Case | Profit amount/dollar | Name/Abbreviation | Opportunity Quantity/Case | Profit amount/dollar |
| Hu Tuan | 1461 | 2394656 | Hu Jian | 191 | 506996 |
| Mimi is obedient | 1731 | 4327362 | Huang Guangping | 67 | 67340 |
| Qin Tuan | 119 | 1666508 | Huang Xiaojun | 65 | 64000 |
| Luo family | 817 | 830875 | Zhang Yi | 141 | 127710 |
| Peng family | 447 | 594622 | Zhang Wangcheng | 218 | 107900 |
| Lee family | 146 | 125807 | Xu Zhong | 67 | 203862 |
| The Cui family | 549 | 607174 | Zhang Tao | 57 | 74160 |
| Han family | 168 | 137935 | Zhang wei | 133 | 136693 |
| Hu family | 508 | 2736408 | Zhu Zhipeng | 57 | 84148 |
| Zhang family | 87 | 75000 | Cai Xingyang | 76 | 72000 |
| Zhou family | 60 | 289000 | Huang Junlin | 49 | 49176 |
After data comparison, although the number of lawsuits filed by Qin Tuan is not large, the amount of compensation is huge, of which Liu Nashu filed 14 lawsuits, and the amount of compensation was as high as 544171 yuan; Chen Tianqing filed 11 lawsuits of 239634 yuan; Chen Jing filed 9 lawsuits and received 236225 yuan in compensation. In addition to the above-mentioned counterfeiters, further searching found that there were many counterfeiters who filed a small number of similar lawsuits, but received a huge amount of compensation, such as Fang Lei, who filed 42 lawsuits and made 341764 yuan; Song Haodong filed 33 lawsuits, and the amount of profits 1060782 yuan.
The above is only a judgment and does not include the amount of withdrawal settlement and private settlement.
3. Defendants in professional counterfeiting
Taking food liability disputes as the cause of the case, the largest number of cases involved in litigation was found through the search, such as supermarkets, agricultural and sideline food stores, tea shops, and pharmacies.
(1) Supermarkets
The top five supermarkets to be subject to professional anti-counterfeiting group lawsuits are Yonghui Supermarket, Yipin Hongyu Supermarket, China Resources Vanguard Supermarket, New Century Supermarket and RT-Mart Supermarket. Among them, Yonghui has 2419 pieces, Yipin Hongyu 815 pieces, CHINA Resources Vanguard 794 pieces, New Century 738 pieces, and RT-Mart 159 pieces. The compensation amount of Yonghui is about 2556332 yuan, the compensation amount of China Resources Vanguard is about 2200362 yuan, and the compensation amount of the new century is about 920710 yuan.
(2) Small non-food restaurants
In addition to large supermarket chains, professional counterfeiters have also targeted small grocery stores and food business departments. The amount of compensation for each non-staple food store and food business department ranges from thousands to hundreds of thousands, taking the Ba nan District Xilexuan Food Business Department as an example, in a lawsuit alone, it will compensate the plaintiff 180,000 yuan, which is undoubtedly a disaster for a food business department.
Through inquiries, it was found that many of the non-staple food stores that had been involved in the lawsuit had been closed or cancelled, including: Huiwanjia Vice Food Store in Jiangbei District, Tao Xiong Vice Food Store in Shapingba District, Duohui Food Business Department in Bishan District, Xilexuan Food Business Department in Banan District, Liao Hui Food Business Department in Nan'an District, Haoyouxin Food Business Department in Dadukou District, Huangjian Food Business Department in Dadukou District, Wo Nong Fresh and Yizhi Food Business Department in Dadukou District, Weihong Food Business Department in Yubei District, Xinxing Food Business Department in Yuzhong District, Yihang Food Business Department in Jiangbei District, and Meijie Food Supermarket in Banan District , Banan District Jukehui Supermarket, etc. have been cancelled.
(3) Tea shops
A total of 170 results were further retrieved using "tea" as a keyword, and according to statistics, in these 170 cases, all defendants paid a total of 5966983 yuan, and the plaintiff in one case was compensated more than 500,000 yuan. The tea market has become the "new blue ocean" of professional counterfeiters, and only in 2020 and 2021, professional counterfeiters have been compensated up to 3320178 yuan in the Chongqing tea market.
According to one operator, tea sales are mainly bulk, especially Pu'er tea and green tea. Some counterfeiters induce operators to pre-package tea leaves in the name of gifts, and then make claims on the grounds that the pre-package labels do not meet the requirements. Many operators of the Panxi Tea Market in Chongqing were overwhelmed and forced to close their doors.
(4) Pharmacies
A total of 143 results were further searched with the keyword "pharmacy", and according to statistics, a total of 3756804 yuan was compensated. Xinhu Pharmacy had the highest amount of compensation, with a total compensation of 1593184 yuan, of which the compensation for Jia Long alone was as high as 1,355,700 yuan. Yongchuan District Changsheng Duxin Pharmacy, only 2 lawsuits to compensate the amount of up to 1194,000 yuan. Song Haodong, a professional counterfeiter, made a claim by purchasing "ginseng peptide" food online and became an "expert" in the field of "ginseng peptide". The court found that the "ginseng peptide" came from "ginseng" as the reason, identified the ginseng peptide as ginseng, and then ruled that the label of the ginseng peptide product did not conform to the label of ginseng, and ruled that the operator lost the lawsuit. Song Haodong made a profit of 781431 yuan by purchasing drugs and health care products in Chongqing.
4. Summary
(1) Summary of data on occupational counterfeiting cases in Chongqing
This report analyzes the data of occupational counterfeiting in the field of food safety from January 1, 2017 to December 31, 2021 in Chongqing, focusing on the environmental situation of counterfeiting in Chongqing, the characteristics of professional counterfeiters, and the industry distribution of counterfeiters.
The analysis of this report shows that Chongqing is generally more tolerant of professional counterfeiting, and is in the forefront of the success rate and absolute number of cases, which objectively promotes the phenomenon of professional counterfeiters pouring into Chongqing to fight counterfeiting. The data shows that professional counterfeiters in Chongqing area show the characteristics of family, group and corporatization, and some counterfeiters have obtained higher compensation through individual cases and all cases. In Chongqing, the targets of counterfeiting are mainly supermarkets, small food stores, pharmacies, tea shops and farmers dealing in agricultural products, and some of the faked stores were closed and cancelled shortly after the lawsuit.
(2) Reflections on professional crackdowns on counterfeiting
On the one hand, mainland law substantively limits the scope of consumers, but on the other hand, based on policy considerations, it has carried out a certain tolerance for professional counterfeiting, which objectively leads to a split between theory and practice in the determination of professional counterfeiting. Most of the anti-counterfeiters obviously exceed the limits stipulated by law, and actually use the anti-counterfeiting team to carry out business behavior, which is a clear proof of the group and corporatization of the anti-counterfeiting team in Chongqing. In individual cases, some judges were lazy in ascertaining, further conniving at the trend of profit-making and expansion of professional counterfeiters.
At present, some areas have continuously appeared cases of denial of professional counterfeiting, and many useful adjudication rules have been created. For example, the Zhuhai court only supports the "first case compensation" for professional counterfeiting, and the court believes that the purpose of civil counterfeiting should be to notify the removal of shelves and eliminate food safety hazards, rather than repeatedly and crowd purchases for profit. The Guangzhou Internet Court emphasized in the White Paper on the Trial of Online Shopping Contract Disputes in the Guangzhou Internet Court that it must be purchased based on daily consumption, and strictly distinguishes between unsafe food and unqualified food, and safe but unqualified food is not subject to ten times compensation. The Shenzhen Bao'an Court found similar cases raised by counterfeiters through a similar case search in the (2021) Yue 0311 Min Chu No. 2248 case, and then held that professional counterfeiting was contrary to the core values of socialism.
In addition, some regions have even included the fight against counterfeiting in individual occupations as criminal offences. For example, in the (2020) Jing 0108 Xingchu No. 2220, (2020) Su 02 Xingzhong No. 284, and (2020) E0922 Xingchu No. 227 cases, the trial courts in Beijing, Jiangsu, and Hubei found that they had the intent to engage in illegal possession, constituting the crime of extortion.
(3) Outlook
At the beginning of the emergence of professional counterfeiting, it had the effect of purifying the market environment, so it was recognized by the public. However, at present, the characteristics of familyization, grouping and corporatization of professional anti-counterfeiting have far exceeded the original intention of the establishment of the punitive compensation system. Professional counterfeiters have changed from the dragon slayer teenager to the evil dragon. Sociologist Xia Xueluan compares those "professional counterfeiters" who are for profit to "parasites bred by poor business life." In practice, there are even counterfeiters who have begun to engage in teaching and paid more anti-counterfeiting apprentices, and this industry has obviously begun to go astray, and even affected the local business environment. To solve this problem, it is necessary to reflect on and adjust punitive damages from the legislative point of view, and refine the application scenarios of fraud and compensation, but before the legislative solution, the judicial organs should also exert their initiative and use the basic principles of law to correct and compensate in individual cases to avoid adverse consequences caused by judicial passivism.
Acknowledgements: The data collection and collation work in this article was mainly completed by Xi Yuling, who thanked her for her hard work and strong support.
Author | Zhao Changjiang, Research Center for Network Social Development of Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications
Source | Sub-non-fish said labor law
Audit | Jackie Yu, Zhang Lijuan
Edit | Yellow circle
Produced by the New Media and Digital Publishing Department of China Industry and Commerce Publishing House
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Qi! All the regulations since the establishment of the State Administration for Market Regulation are here (Order No. 1-52)
No annual report yet? No annual report? Come and listen to the lesson! Today at 14:00, I will teach you to report the annual report! The 2022 semi-monthly issue of "Market Supervision and Management" is in full swing! New revision, flexible and convenient to scan codes and subscribe!