Yang Jia · Full chronicle and history

On November 26, 2018, people from different parts of the country made a special trip to Futian Cemetery in Beijing to pay tribute to Beijing youth Yang Jia, who was executed ten years earlier. A Radio Free Asia report reviewed the origins of the incident: in 2007, he was stopped while riding a rented bicycle in Shanghai, subjected to six hours of interrogation and violent abuse.

During the 2013 Qingming Festival, the public faced little obstruction in mourning Zhao Ziyang, but six artists and more than thirty petitioners who went to Yang Jia's grave in Beijing were taken away by the police station. Netizens called Yang Jia a knight-errant and a swordsman.

On April 4, 2012, Qingming, more than ten petitioners went to Yang Jia's grave in Beijing to pay their respects. The area around the grave was swarming with police, and surveillance cameras had been installed. Five petitioners, including Mao Hengfeng, were taken away by police as soon as they arrived at the grave.

The film When Night Falls, directed by Shanghai-based director Ying Liang, tells from the perspective of Yang Jia's mother, Wang Jingmei, her experience of being illegally confined in a psychiatric hospital after her son's arrest and her subsequent efforts on his behalf. The film was screened at the Jeonju International Film Festival and the Locarno Film Festival in 2012, where Ying Liang won the Best Director award at Locarno, after which he left Shanghai following threats of arrest.

Around the third anniversary of Yang Jia's execution on November 26, 2011, Chinese netizens launched memorial activities online, and many reposted his line, "If you don't give me an explanation, I'll give you one." NTD's report noted that the netizens' commemoration was mainly an expression of dissatisfaction with autocratic privilege through Yang Jia.

On December 18, 2010, Ai Weiwei was interviewed by the documentary program of Sunny TV, talking about Yang Jia as he knew him: he liked blogging, mountain climbing, and spending time with people he liked — not a reclusive person, but a person who made choices. He said Yang Jia went this far to defend the dignity of life; when most people swallow down filthy things, Yang Jia said, I won't swallow this.

Around December 2010, the second trial of the He Shengkai case in Guizhou opened, which the outside world called the "Guizhou Yang Jia case." He Shengkai once wrote in his diary, "Yang Jia's fine deed is Xuanyuan's lamentable affair." Netizens and lawyers placed his case alongside the Yang Jia case, worried that his judicial rights and interests would not be safeguarded.

November 26, 2010 marked the second anniversary of Yang Jia’s execution. His mother, Wang Jingmei, traveled to Beijing’s Futian Cemetery to pay her respects, and the authorities deployed police to monitor her. Radio Free Asia reported that Yang Jia is regarded by many as a victim of China’s judicial system.

On April 5, 2010, Qingming Festival, Wang Jingmei went to Beijing Futian Cemetery to pay respects to her son. Large numbers of police and plainclothes officers surrounded the cemetery, several people filmed the mourners with video cameras, and more than a dozen police cars were parked nearby. The police told Wang Jingmei that Yang Jia's grave would receive "special attention."

On the morning of November 26, 2008, Yang Jia was executed by lethal injection in Shanghai at the age of 28. This was only five days after the Supreme People's Court issued its approval ruling, and less than a day after his mother received the ruling.

Three days before Yang Jia was executed, Wang Jingmei, who had been held for four months, was brought by police from a psychiatric hospital in Beijing to a detention center in Shanghai to visit her son. It was the first time mother and son had met since the incident, and also the last.

On November 21, 2008, the Supreme People's Court issued a criminal ruling approving the death sentence of Yang Jia. It was only after 7 p.m. on November 25 that Wang Jingmei received this ruling, with only one night left before the execution.

On November 9, 2008, Yang Jia's aunt, Wang Jingrong, went to a psychiatric hospital under the arrangement of Beijing police to see her younger sister Wang Jingmei, who was being held there. This was the first time the family had seen Wang Jingmei since she disappeared four months earlier. She had been confined at the Compulsory Treatment Management Division of the Beijing Public Security Bureau, known externally as Ankang Hospital.

On October 20, 2008, the Shanghai High People's Court issued Criminal Ruling (2008) Hu Gao Xing Zhong Zi No. 131, rejecting Yang Jia's appeal, upholding the first-instance death sentence, and reporting it to the Supreme People's Court for review and approval. When the ruling was issued, Yang Jia's mother, Wang Jingmei, was still confined in a psychiatric hospital.

On the day of Yang Jia's second-instance trial, a large crowd gathered outside the Shanghai High People's Court, with some shouting "Long live Yang Jia." About a dozen protesters wearing T-shirts printed with Yang Jia's portrait and the words "If you don't give me an explanation, I'll give you one" were taken away on the spot in front of the police. This was a rare street action in China in support of a defendant.

At 9:30 a.m. on October 13, 2008, the Shanghai High People's Court opened the second-instance trial of the Yang Jia case in a closed hearing. The defense lawyer requested a new psychiatric evaluation, but the court rejected it on the spot, ruling that the grounds were insufficient. During the hearing, the prosecution and the defense debated the appearance of witnesses, the qualifications of the appraisal institution, and whether Yang Jia had been beaten at the police station.

On the day of the second trial, a man who had come to observe the proceedings was dragged, beaten and taken away by a group of police officers on the road in front of the Shanghai High People's Court, and has been missing ever since. His pregnant wife publicly asked Hu Jintao to return her husband. Petitioners estimate that between 9 a.m. and noon that day, five vans full of people were taken away, more than 100 in total.

On the morning of September 1, 2008, the Shanghai No. 2 Intermediate People's Court announced its verdict, sentencing Yang Jie to death for intentional homicide and deprivation of political rights for life. Yang Jie and his defense lawyer did not speak throughout the announcement, nor did they indicate whether they would appeal. Online questions about the closed trial, the qualifications of the appraiser, and the identity of the defense lawyer immediately spread.

On the afternoon of August 26, 2008, the Yang Jia case was heard in first instance at the Shanghai No. 2 Intermediate People's Court; the hearing was postponed to this day because of the Beijing Olympics. The court gave all the gallery seats to the Shanghai Public Security Bureau, more than 20 domestic and foreign media outlets and citizens who came to observe were turned away, and the hearing notice was only displayed on the electronic screen in front of the court. No verdict was announced that day.

On July 19, 2008, the Shanghai Bar Association publicly stated that Yang Jia had officially hired Xie Youming and Xie Jin as his defense attorneys for the first instance trial. Xie Youming is also a legal advisor to the Zhabei District government, and the crime scene was the Zhabei District Public Security Bureau. The legal community and netizens questioned whether this violated legal regulations and constituted a conflict of interest.

On the afternoon of July 5, 2008, the Shanghai Justice Bureau received a commission from the police, and experts from the Institute of Forensic Science of the Ministry of Justice arrived at the detention center that same day to complete the psychiatric evaluation of Yang Jia, concluding that he had no mental illness and possessed full criminal responsibility. An evaluation that normally takes 30 days was completed in a single day. Lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan pointed out that the evaluation procedure was seriously unlawful, and the body that conducted the evaluation was also accused of lacking forensic evaluation qualifications. During the second trial, the lawyer again applied for a re-evaluation, which was rejected by the court.

After the Yang Jia case occurred, artist Ai Weiwei published a series of posts on his blog, pressing questions about the details of Yang Jia's case, the circumstances of his mother being committed to a psychiatric hospital, and the violations of procedure during the trial; his blog at one point became a gathering point for online public opinion. After that, he spoke out for Yang Jia multiple times.

The night after the Yang Jia case occurred, his mother Wang Jingmei was first taken to the Datun Police Station in Chaoyang District, and was then sent by Shanghai and Beijing police to the Ankang Psychiatric Hospital of the Beijing Public Security Bureau in Shunyi District and forcibly detained. Her family only learned of her whereabouts four months later, and legal professionals pointed out that there was no regulatory basis whatsoever for sending her to a psychiatric hospital.

On July 1, 2008, Yang Jia, a young man from Beijing, walked alone into the Zhabei Public Security Bureau in Shanghai, stabbing six police officers to death and wounding four officers and one security guard, and was arrested on the spot. In October of the previous year, while riding a rented bicycle in Shanghai, he was stopped and questioned by Zhabei police, taken into the police station and beaten. For the following nine months he filed complaints everywhere but could not get any redress. On November 26 of the same year, Yang Jia was executed by the Chinese Communist Party's tyrannical regime.

On March 15, 2008, the inspection squad of the Zhabei Branch went to Beijing again to speak with Yang Jia. By then, five months had passed since Yang Jia's first complaint, and the Shanghai police still maintained that there had been no problem with the officers' law-enforcement actions — no apology and no compensation.

On October 16, 2007, the inspection squad of the Zhabei Branch went to Beijing to visit Yang Jia and his mother, Wang Jingmei. Yang Jia demanded that the police pay 10,000 yuan in compensation. The inspection squad did not agree, nor did it discipline any police officer.

After dawn on October 6, 2007, Yang Jia left the police station and took a train back to Beijing. From that day on, he repeatedly filed complaints through petition letters and emails with the Shanghai Public Security Bureau and the inspection department of the Zhabei Branch, demanding the dismissal of the officers involved, compensation for emotional distress, and reimbursement of telephone charges. After investigation, the inspection detachment of the Zhabei Branch concluded that the officers' law enforcement was not improper, and the complaint received no apology whatsoever.

On the evening of October 5, 2007, Yang Jie was sightseeing in Shanghai. Riding a rented bicycle past the intersection of Zhijiang West Road and Pushan Road in Zhabei District, he was stopped by officers from the Zhijiang West Road police station and taken into the station for questioning until the early hours of October 6. He said he was insulted and beaten inside the station, which was the starting point of his nonstop complaints over the following year.

Yang Jia was born in Beijing on August 27, 1980, and was the only son of his mother, Wang Jingmei. His parents divorced when he was a child, after which mother and son depended on each other.