Respectable Ladies and Gentlemen of Wang Wenyi’s Jury,
Greetings! First let me express my respect to you all.
When I take up my pen to write this letter to you from Beijing, China, my lawyer’s certificate has been illegally suspended for nearly six months by my government. During this time, the Chinese communist authority has been using, each day, at least a hundred policemen, secret agents, and gang members to monitor me, my wife and my 12-year old daughter on a 24-hour basis. They follow us closely, harassing and terrifying us, disregarding any rationality, morality, commonly recognized principles, and even laws and regulations that this government has itself published.
My law firm has been forcibly closed by violent means. The Chinese regime’s agents have not only cut off our family’s connection and communication with the outside world; they have also, in the past six months, illegally kidnapped several hundred people who came to visit me. Many of them are still nowhere to be found. Still, my family and I are much “luckier” than the criminally-charged Ms. Wang Wenyi and many more Falun Gong practitioners who have been persecuted in the most inhumane means.
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you are witnessing and serving the independent legal system of the US, a system that is as able as the human civilization and wisdom can offer thus far to prevent injustice. I should consider Ms. Wang Wenyi lucky to be tried under this kind of system instead of mainland China’s Party-controlled and terror-filled “legal system.” However, as far as Ms. Wang Wenyi is concerned, this trial itself is unjust.
Even though I have much trust in the just nature of your country’s legal system, each individual case will bring to bear its own underlying background. In the case of Ms. Wang Wenyi, what is the psychological background that is related to her action for which she is charged? What is the background against which Wang Wenyi raised her wish that Mr. Bush ask the Chinese communist regime to stop its persecution of Falun Gong?
In other words, what is happening in China, a country that is being violently controlled by the Communist Party? What is the nature of the atrocity that has happened in China that prompted Wang Wenyi to voice her urgent protest in that kind of setting? What is the magnitude of the atrocity? How do we consider the relationship between the atrocity that is taking place in China and the large tenet of human civilization? How do we balance the value of stopping this atrocity and the need to maintain order at the event?
If you do not consider these background factors that influenced or even determined Wang Wenyi’s choice, you will not be able to ensure a just conclusion. If so, the value for legal justice in your country and the reputation of your legal system will suffer damage just as Ms. Wang Wenyi would on the receiving end of such a trial. Such damage should be avoidable.
As a reporter, Ms. Wang Wenyi is familiar with the rules set for people involved in situations like she faced. This is where each of you in the jury, as well as the judge, need to extend your normal consideration. For someone who knows the rules, for a believer (of Falun Gong), as a normal human being who did not have any negative record, why did she choose to violate the rules at the risk of bringing troubles for herself?
