Will judgment documents be made public online in the future, and how can the public's right to access them be protected?

The cumulative number of judgment documents published by the China Judgment Opinions Network over the years (10,000 copies)

On December 22, the Supreme People's Court issued an announcement on soliciting reference cases from the people's courts' case database, and the heads of relevant departments of the Supreme People's Court responded to relevant questions from the China Judgment Opinions Network.

According to the announcement, the people's court's case database will include authoritative cases that the Supreme People's Court has reviewed and found to have reference and demonstration value for similar cases. After the completion of the case database, it will cover all kinds of crimes and causes of action, and there will also be corresponding cases on different legal application issues under the same crime and the same cause of action.

According to the announcement, after the completion of the case database, it will be open to the public, so that the people can more effectively understand and Xi the law through cases, know the norms of behavior, enhance litigation expectations, promote the governance of litigation sources, and fulfill the requirements of "grasping the front end and curing the disease"; at the same time, it will also provide more vivid, accurate and authoritative reference and research materials for the majority of legal and judicial circles.

In response to the question of "whether the judgment documents of the Supreme People's Court and local people's courts at all levels will still be made public online", the person in charge pointed out that the judgment opinion network that is now open to the public will continue to play its due role, and at the same time, the standards for the online use of judgment documents also need to be optimized, the mechanism needs to be standardized, and the relevant work will continue to be carried out in accordance with the principles of strict law, prudence and appropriateness, and supervision in accordance with law.

Focus response

Will the case database be open to the public? A: Open to experts, scholars, lawyers, parties and other members of the public!

Q: The Supreme People's Court issued the Announcement on Soliciting Reference Cases from the People's Court's Case Database, which has attracted great attention from the society, especially legal professionals. Could you please briefly introduce the background and considerations for the construction of the people's court's case database? Will the case database be open to the public? What are the advantages of the people's court's case database compared with the China Judgment Network? Why is it necessary to openly solicit cases this time?

A: The Supreme People's Court's decision to establish a people's court case database is to improve the search accuracy, degree of recognition, reference strength and application breadth of the cases in the database, and to maximize the practical effectiveness of the cases. After the completion of the case database, it will cover all kinds of crimes and causes of action, and there will also be corresponding cases on different legal application issues under the same crime and the same cause of action. When hearing a case, the people's court must consult the case database and make a judgment with reference to similar cases in the database, so as to ensure uniform application of law and uniform adjudication standards, and avoid "different judgments in the same case".

After the case database is completed, it will of course be open to the public, including experts, scholars, lawyers, and parties! Only when it is open to the public can it be convenient for the masses of the people to learn and understand the law more effectively through cases, to be aware Xi of the norms of conduct, to enhance their expectations for litigation, and to promote the management of litigation sources; at the same time, it will also provide more vivid, accurate, and authoritative reference and research materials for the vast number of people in the legal and judicial circles. On the one hand, the construction of the case database can make up for the shortcomings of the long compilation and selection period of guiding cases, the extremely limited total amount, and the inability to meet the needs of practice, and on the other hand, it can solve the problem of "finding a needle in a haystack" and low efficiency in searching for judgment documents online, and is a new type of "judicial supply" and "rule of law product" provided for demand-side innovation. Compared with the judgment opinion network, the people's court's case database has the following characteristics and advantages:

First, the style is standardized, and the elements are complete, which is convenient for accurate retrieval. For legal searchers, the cause of action and the charges are only the most basic search basis, and if they want to achieve an efficient and accurate search, they must rely on the keywords of the facts involved, and if complex adjudication rules are involved, they also need to rely on accurate and concise adjudication gist. For example, there is controversy in practice as to whether a prostitute's rented dwelling in a residential area that is used both for daily living and as a place of prostitution can be recognized as a "household" in the context of "home robbery". If you simply search for "robbery" or "robbery", I am afraid it will be difficult to accurately locate the corresponding case, but if there are keywords and gist assistance such as "prostitute", "prostitution place" and "residence", the search effect will be very different. In accordance with the requirements for the establishment of the people's courts' case databases, the cases entered must use a uniform format, including numbers, titles, subtitles, keywords, basic case facts, reasons for the adjudication, gist of the adjudication, and related indexes. The standardization and standardization of the style can effectively improve the convenience and accuracy of retrieval.

Second, standardize the submission, strictly review, and have authority and guidance. At present, cases in the people's courts' case database are mainly submitted by local courts in accordance with procedures, and all the trial divisions of the Supreme People's Court are responsible for their counterparts in accordance with their professional lines, examine and check them, and are collectively discussed and approved by the judges' conference; Therefore, the authority of the cases entered into the database is fully guaranteed, and courts at all levels shall refer to them when hearing similar cases; where courts at all levels find that it is inappropriate to refer to the relevant cases in the database when revising laws or judicial interpretations or adjusting judicial policies in their adjudication work, they shall explain the reasons and submit the case in progress to the adjudication committee for discussion, or report to the higher court to elevate jurisdiction, and where an effective judgment establishes new adjudication rules, a new case shall be compiled and issued to replace the original case.

Third, we need to make overall plans and provide comprehensive coverage to meet the needs of the judiciary. The number of documents on the Judgment Opinions Network is huge, but there is a serious asymmetry in the types and number of cases, specifically, the number of common and frequent cases is unusually large and disorderly stacked, and the number of new and rare cases is abnormally small or even none. At the beginning of the construction of the people's courts' case databases, it was clearly required that for cases with similar circumstances, the same applicable laws and judicial interpretations, and the same reference and demonstration role, the number of cases in the database should generally not exceed 2, so as to prevent duplication and overlapping. In the process of building the case database, we regularly inform the courts across the country of the type and number of cases in the database, and promptly put forward requirements for the submitted cases on the application of law that have gaps in the system and are highly controversial, and strive to achieve the maximum coverage of all crimes and causes of action in the cases in the database in a relatively short period of time. For the application of different laws under the same legal article, we also strive to achieve a comprehensive supply of rules and guidance through corresponding cases. For example, with regard to the voluntary surrender system provided for in article 67 of the Criminal Law, there are many practical issues, such as whether "waiting at the scene while knowing that others have reported the crime", "truthfully confessing the facts of the crime once summoned", and "failing to truthfully confess to the co-offender after voluntarily surrendering" can be found to be voluntary surrender, and each item will also have a corresponding reference case included.

The construction of the people's courts' case database requires not only the strength of courts across the country, but also the participation and support of all sectors of society. After more than three months of hard work, the people's court's case database has included more than 2,000 reference cases, but there is still a big gap in the number and coverage of cases compared with the needs of judicial practice and the expectations of the people. The Supreme People's Court's announcement is aimed at broadening the sources of reference cases, enriching the resources of the case database, and soliciting cases from relevant organs, social organizations, law schools, scientific research units, experts and scholars, lawyers, and interested and researched individual citizens, so as to further optimize the construction model of the case database. After the completion of the case database, we will provide the public with more convenient and high-quality search services, and explore the introduction of expert review and user evaluation mechanisms to ensure that the cases in the database can better play a positive role in unifying adjudication standards, leading social value orientation, and promoting the compliance of the whole people with the law.

Why has the number of online documents dropped sharply? Answer: There are problems such as the effectiveness of use, the protection of rights, and security risks, and we should strictly screen risks and improve disclosure standards

Q: We have noticed that perhaps related to the construction of the people's courts' case database is that the number of online documents on the China Judgment Opinions Network has been declining sharply in recent years, does this mean that the Supreme People's Court has adjusted its direction of deepening judicial openness?

A: Since its establishment in 2013, the China Judgments Network has played an important and positive role in promoting the construction of an open, dynamic, transparent and convenient sunshine judicial mechanism. However, in the past ten years, with the increase in the number of documents on the judgment opinion network, the increase in social attention, and the rapid development of big data analysis technology, the shortcomings have been repeatedly criticized, mainly in the following three aspects:

First, there is the issue of the use effect. Specifically, the first is the inconvenience of retrieval. Although the number of online documents has exceeded 100 million, they are only simply accumulated, lacking keywords and the gist of the adjudication, and it is difficult to achieve accurate retrieval. Second, the standards are not uniform. Front-line judges reported that online documents come from more than 3,500 courts across the country, and they have different judgments on the application of similar laws, and not only are it difficult to find the cases they need, but even if they find similar cases, they are at a loss and unable to refer to them due to different rules and standards. Third, the authority is not enough. Some lawyers complain that online documents lack official authoritative recognition, and the search reports and legal opinions formed on the basis of them are not recognized by courts at different levels and regions, and often spend a lot of energy on searching, but the actual results are little.

Second, the issue of rights protection. In many countries outside the region, online documents mainly come from higher-level courts such as the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, and focus more on interpretation and analysis. There are a large number of summary procedures or small claims litigation cases heard by basic courts, which not only have limited legal significance, but also carry all kinds of factual and identity information. In some labor dispute cases, parties to labor dispute cases have been repeatedly denied access to jobs because relevant documents have been published online. Some parties have their pre-marital information disclosed on the Internet, resulting in family disharmony and husband and wife turning against each other. Due to the disclosure of information related to litigation, some private enterprises have been hindered in financing and loans, have difficulties in business cooperation, and are difficult to participate in bidding and bidding. As a result, there are often parties involved, including companies and enterprises, who file complaints.

Third, there is the issue of security risks. At the beginning of the establishment of the Judgment Opinions Network, big data "crawling" and analysis technology were not yet popular. After a large number of documents are put online, they have gradually become an information resource of concern to all parties because they carry a large amount of information on national conditions and social conditions. Some commercial companies convert the "crawled" document data into legal retrieval, corporate credit, and artificial intelligence "products" for profit, but they do not manage them in accordance with the requirements of security, compliance, and controllability, and some "black and gray industries" even engage in illegal activities such as extortion, information reselling, and swiping traffic.

In response to the above problems, since July 2021, the Supreme People's Court has adopted a number of targeted rectification measures in accordance with the feedback, demands and suggestions of relevant parties. Through strict risk screening and improved disclosure standards, the number of online documents per year dropped from 19.2 million in 2020 and 14.9 million in 2021 to 10.4 million in 2022. Since January 2023, the number of online documents has been 5.11 million. It can be said that since 2021, the work of optimizing the mechanism for the disclosure of judgment documents has been carried out in an orderly manner, but it has never "stopped" the online use of documents. As mentioned above, in order to address the problems of inconvenience in use, inaccurate retrieval, and inconsistent standards on the Judgment Document Network, the Supreme People's Court decided to establish a "People's Court Case Database" in July 2023 after research. Compared with the previous public method of "uploading facts and simply accumulating" judgment documents, the case database will include authoritative cases that have reference and demonstration value for similar cases and have been reviewed and approved by the Supreme People's Court, and will become an "upgraded version" of the judgment opinion website in terms of application and efficiency in the future. The two are complementary and complement each other, and it is not necessary to use the library as a network and open one over the other.

It should be emphasized that "disclosure" and "publicity" cannot be equated, and judicial openness does not mean that all judicial information must be published on the Internet. In accordance with the Constitution and laws, court hearings are conducted openly in accordance with law, and the principle of open trial in accordance with law is practiced when the judgment is pronounced and served on the parties. Judicial openness includes both online and offline disclosure, and includes both disclosure to parties and the public. The law has different requirements for different forms of disclosure and for different objects. In particular, after the promulgation of the Civil Code, the Personal Information Protection Law, and the Data Security Law, new and higher requirements have been put forward for judicial openness. The key to the people's courts' work on judicial openness needs to be deepened and optimized with the times, and the key is to implement the Constitution and legal provisions, uphold the people-centered development philosophy, fully satisfy the parties' rights to participate and know, and facilitate the people's and all sectors of society to understand and supervise, and earnestly do a good job of rights protection and risk prevention and control work, so as to prevent the legitimate rights and interests of citizens, the production and operation of enterprises, and the public interest from being adversely affected by improper disclosure.

In short, the direction of the people's courts' efforts to continue to promote sunshine justice will not change, and the attitude of providing more high-quality and efficient judicial services by deepening and optimizing judicial openness will not change!

There is already a network of judgment documents, so why is there a database of judgment documents? Answer: It provides a basis and reference for formulating judicial policies, promoting judicial reform, and putting forward judicial suggestions

Question: What are the main considerations for establishing a national court judgment database in addition to the China Judgment Opinion Network, and what is the function of the judgment document database?

A: Litigation is known as a "barometer" of economic and social development. The massive amount of judgment document data is not only an important basis for analyzing the situation of trial enforcement work, but also an important reference for studying and judging the situation of economic and social development. In order to strengthen trial management, assist judicial decision-making, and serve the state and social governance, the Supreme People's Court has decided to establish a national database of court judgment documents, gathering all kinds of judgment documents within the special network of the four levels of courts.

Due to the lack of keywords and the gist of the adjudication, the inconvenience of query and retrieval on the judgment document network also exists in the judgment document database, therefore, the judgment document database is not mainly to provide judges with similar case inquiries, but to focus on the analysis and application of judicial big data in national and social governance, and provide a basis and reference for formulating judicial policies, promoting judicial reform, and putting forward judicial suggestions. For example, by analyzing the situation of courts across the country rejecting the lawsuit, upholding the original judgment, and remanding for a new trial, the problem of "procedural idling" can be discovered and dealt with in a timely and targeted manner; by analyzing the situation of a specific batch of lawsuits, the problems of false litigation, "patent extortion" and "hunting rights protection" can be discovered and effectively dealt with in a timely manner; The relationship between specific judges can sort out clues on the study and judgment of judicial integrity; through analyzing the abnormal rise and fall in the number of relevant cases over a period of time, judicial suggestions for improving management and governance can be put forward to relevant departments and industries in a targeted manner, and so on.

In the future, how will the public consult effective documents in accordance with the law? Answer: The judgment document network will continue to play its due role, and the standards for accessing the Internet also need to be optimized, and the mechanism needs to be standardized

Question: In the future, will the judgment documents of the Supreme People's Court and local people's courts at all levels be made public online? What are the considerations for the next step?

At the same time, the standards for online access to judgment documents also need to be optimized, mechanisms need to be standardized, and relevant work will continue to advance in accordance with the principles of strict law, prudence and appropriateness, and supervision in accordance with law.

First, adhere to the principle of strict law. Both the Civil and Administrative Litigation Laws provide that the public can consult effective judgment documents, but do not require that effective documents must be published on the same online platform. Globally, the vast majority of national judgments are only published on the official websites of their courts, and in many countries, document databases are mainly operated by commercial companies. In the next step, we will adopt a combination of online disclosure and offline inquiry, strictly implement the provisions of the law, and fully protect the public's right to consult effective documents in accordance with the law.

Second, adhere to the principle of prudence and appropriateness. Many parties, including citizens and enterprises, have submitted opinions on the impact on the operations of individuals, families, and enterprises caused by the publication of judgment documents involved in the case, and request that the release of the documents on the Internet should be subject to their own consent or that of their own units. We need to take into account the above demands and balance the interests of all parties. The people's courts at all levels will continue to regularly publish judgment documents on the Judgment Opinions Network, and at the same time, they will more prudently coordinate and balance the relationship between satisfying the public's right to know and supervision, and protecting data, information security, and personal privacy, and give full play to the functions of good cases and good documents in carrying forward the spirit of socialist rule of law, cultivating citizens' legal awareness, serving high-quality development and high-level security, and promoting the modernization of national and social governance.

Third, adhere to the principle of supervision according to law. We will strengthen regulation, conduct interviews with relevant commercial establishments on their improper use of judgment document data, guide and urge their use of data in accordance with law and compliance, and work with relevant departments to lawfully sanction illegal conduct such as the use of document data to harm national security and judicial authority, infringe upon the lawful rights and interests of citizens and enterprises, and undermine market order, to jointly promote a safer, orderly, and standardized operation of the judgment document network.

Comprehensive Xinhua News Agency and the websites of the Supreme People's Court

Voice

Some commercial companies convert the "crawled" document data into legal retrieval, corporate credit, and artificial intelligence "products" for profit, but they do not manage them in accordance with the requirements of security, compliance, and controllability, and some "black and gray industries" even engage in illegal activities such as extortion, information reselling, and swiping traffic.

It can be said that since 2021, the work of optimizing the mechanism for the disclosure of judgment documents has been carried out in an orderly manner, but it has never "stopped" the online use of documents.

It should be emphasized that "disclosure" and "publicity" cannot be equated, and judicial openness does not mean that all judicial information must be published on the Internet.

-- Heads of relevant departments of the Supreme People's Court

Data collection and analysis: Li Weifeng, researcher of Nandu Big Data Research Institute Data source: work reports of the Supreme People's Court over the years, media reports, etc