In 2011, Chen Junjie (roughly “Jwin-jyeh”), an average, law-abiding Chinese citizen, had been living the coastal province of Guangdong for nine years when he decided to apply for local residence.
Despite everything else seemingly being in order, the Guangdong police turned down Chen’s application without explanation. He also encountered difficulties with his housing loans and driver’s license.
It was only in 2015 that, in a Kafkaesque episode, the authorities informed Chen that the source of his bureaucratic woes was a three-year prison sentence he had supposedly served for a 2008 attempt to rob a bank in the Panyu District of Guangzhou, the provincial capital.
