On April 29, the Lvliang Intermediate People's Court quickly concluded the case of appellant Wang Guifu and eight others for fraud and extortion, and pronounced a second-instance judgment in accordance with the law.
Previously, the Jiaokou County People's Court ruled in the first instance: defendant Wang Guifu and 8 others committed fraud and extortion respectively or jointly, and sentenced Wang Guifu to four years' imprisonment and a fine of 22,000 yuan; Guo Wen was sentenced to one year and three months imprisonment and fined 8,000 yuan; the remaining 6 defendants were convicted of extortion and were sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment ranging from two years and one month to nine months and fifteen days and a corresponding fine.
After the first-instance judgment was pronounced, Wang Guifu and Guo Wen were not satisfied and appealed. The Lvliang Intermediate People's Court formed a collegial panel in accordance with law, and after reading the case file, interrogated the defendant and listened to the defender's opinions.
The second-instance trial was ascertained
Scam facts
In November 2013, defendant Wang Guifu, defrauding him of RMB13,917.6 from the Medical Insurance Center of Jiaokou County by providing false certification materials to the Jiaokou County Medical Insurance Center because he had been injured by others and had already received financial compensation from the other party.
After the incident, the family of defendant Wang Guifu returned the over-reported 4979.65 yuan to the Jiaokou County Medical Insurance Center on May 4, 2016, and 8937.95 yuan to the Jiaokou County Medical Insurance Center on December 25, 2018.
Extortion of facts
(1) In January 2014, defendant Wang Guifu gathered defendants Li Laifu, Li Qingyun, Wang Hongwei, Guo Ping, Wang Zhenqiang, and Li Yanyun, and instigated other villagers to forcibly extort property from the owners of passing coal vehicles on the grounds that the land occupation agreement between Xingrong Company and Antou Village had expired, and forcibly extorted property from the owners of passing coal vehicles for up to a month, citing the expiration of the land occupation agreement between Xingrong Company and Antou Village. During this period, the above-mentioned defendant extorted 30,000 yuan from the victim Wang Yimin and 4,000 yuan from the victim Yan Ping.
During the first-instance trial, the family of defendant Wang Guifu returned 4,000 yuan to the victim Wang Yimin on behalf of the defendant, and the family of defendant Wang Hongwei returned 1,026 yuan to the victim Wang Yimin on behalf of the defendant. The victim, Wang Yimin, expressed forgiveness for the conduct of defendants Wang Guifu, Li Qingyun, Wang Hongwei, Guo Ping, Wang Zhenqiang, and Li Yanyun.
Defendant Li Qingyun's family returned 4,000 yuan to the victim Yanping on behalf of the defendant, and defendant Wang Guifu's family returned 600 yuan to the victim Yanping on behalf of the defendant, and the victim Yanping expressed forgiveness for the behavior of the seven defendants.
(2) In October 2017, defendant Wang Guifu, together with defendants Li Laifu, Guo Wen, Li Qingyun, and Guo Jun (who is at large), obstructed construction on the grounds that the victim Wen Baoyong had built a high-voltage line tower to occupy the land in Antou Village, Shuitou Town, Jiaokou County, and extorted RMB 60,000 from the victim Wen Baoyong in the name of compensation for the land occupation.
The court of second instance held that
The appellant Wang Guifu fabricated facts, concealed the truth, and defrauded 13,917.6 yuan of medical insurance funds for the purpose of illegal possession, which indeed constituted the crime of fraud; the appellant Wang Guifu, together with Guo Wen and others, repeatedly forcibly extorted property from others for the purpose of illegal possession, of which Wang Guifu extorted 94,000 yuan and the appellant Guo Wen extorted 60,000 yuan, and his behavior indeed constituted the crime of extortion. After investigation, the defendant's confession and witness testimony in the case were sufficient to confirm that the appellant Guo Wen, together with Wang Guifu and others, repeatedly used soft violence such as harassment and pestering to forcibly extort 60,000 yuan from the victim in the name of consultation for the purpose of illegal possession, using soft violence such as harassment and pestering to forcibly extort the so-called compensation of 60,000 yuan from the victim, which indeed constituted the crime of extortion, so the opinion was not adopted.
After investigation, the appellant Wang Guifu and others often gathered together and used violence, threats, or other means to carry out illegal and criminal activities on many occasions in the area of Antou Village in Shuitou Town, Jiaokou County, to do evil, bully the people, disrupt economic and social order, and cause a relatively bad impact, which meets the criteria for identifying "evil forces" as stipulated in the "Opinions of the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security, and the Ministry of Justice on Several Issues Concerning the Handling of Criminal Cases involving Evil Forces."
The original judgment comprehensively considered the facts, nature, circumstances, personal danger and degree of harm to society of the two appellants' crimes, and sentenced them to appropriate punishment, there was no circumstance where the sentence was unusually heavy, and the original judgment had given full consideration to the sentencing circumstances proposed by the second appellant and the defender.
In summary, the first-instance judgment of the Jiaokou County People's Court found that the facts were clear, the law was applied correctly, the sentence was not improper, and the trial procedure was legal. Accordingly, in accordance with the provisions of subparagraph (1) of the first paragraph of article 236 of the Criminal Procedure Law of the People's Republic of China, the ruling rejected the appeal and the original judgment was upheld.
【Criteria for Identifying Evil Forces】
In accordance with the provisions of the Opinions of the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security, and the Ministry of Justice on Several Issues Concerning the Handling of Criminal Cases of Evil Forces:
Evil forces refer to illegal and criminal organizations that are often entangled together and use violence, threats, or other means to carry out illegal and criminal activities in a certain area or industry many times, for the purpose of doing evil, bullying the people, disrupting the order of economic and social life, and causing a relatively bad social impact, but have not yet formed a mafia-type organization.
The evil forces are generally more than 3 people, and the aggregators are relatively fixed. Agitators refer to lawbreakers and criminals who play a role in organizing, planning, and directing illegal and criminal activities carried out by evil forces. Members are relatively fixed and meet other requirements for the determination of evil forces, but the repeated implementation of illegal and criminal activities is organized, planned, and directed by different members, and may also be identified as evil forces, and members with the above-mentioned acts may be identified as aggregators.
·“ Frequently entangled together, using violence, threats or other means, to carry out illegal or criminal activities in a certain area or industry multiple times", means that criminal suspects or defendants have repeatedly carried out illegal and criminal activities in a certain area or industry within 2 years by violence, threats or other means, and including the agitators, at least 2 of the same members should have participated in the implementation of illegal and criminal activities multiple times. Where the time for "getting together" is obviously short, and the implementation of illegal and criminal activities has just reached the standard of "multiple times", and it is not enough to cause a relatively bad impact, it should generally not be identified as an evil force.
The illegal and criminal activities carried out by evil forces are mainly forced transactions, intentional injuries, illegal detention, extortion, intentional destruction of property, gathering crowds to fight, picking quarrels and provoking troubles, but also include other illegal and criminal activities that have the characteristics of doing evil and oppressing the people, mainly using violence and threats as a means.
·“ Multiple illegal or criminal activities "shall include at least 1 criminal activity. Where the repeated implementation of illegal acts of a single nature, such as forced trading, illegal detention, extortion, and picking quarrels and provoking troubles, a single circumstance or amount does not constitute a crime, but should be treated as a crime after the criminal law or relevant judicial interpretations or normative documents are added up, and when determining whether it is a "repeated illegal or criminal activity", the illegal act that has been used for accumulation may be counted as 1 criminal activity, and the number of illegal activities is calculated separately for other illegal acts.
・ Where it has been handled or has been used as a mediation of civil disputes, and it is later verified that it is indeed the illegal or criminal activities of evil forces, it may be used as the factual basis for determining the evil forces, but where it does not meet the legally prescribed circumstances, legal responsibility must not be pursued again.
The determination of "disrupting the order of economic and social life and causing a relatively bad social impact" shall be comprehensively grasped in conjunction with factors such as the number of targets of infringement and their number, the number of violations and crimes, the means, the scale, the consequences of personal injury, the amount of economic losses, the amount of illegal gains, the degree of chaos that causes social order, and the degree of impact on the people's sense of security.