China fires lawyer who blew whistle on illegal sale of dead bodies
Metadata
- China fires lawyer who blew whistle on illegal sale of dead bodies
- August 14, 2024
- Article Body Text <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A lawyer who blew the whistle on a grisly nationwide trade in stolen and dismembered corpses has been removed from his position as director of a Beijing law firm, RFA has learned.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Yi Shenghua, who until Wednesday morning local time was listed as a director of the Beijing Yongzhe Law Firm, sparked a </span><a href="https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/china-body-parts-08132024100131.html"><span style="font-weight: 400;">social media storm</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> after he revealed the grisly details of a body-snatching scheme in which dead bodies and body parts were sold off to biotech institutions to be harvested for dental bone grafts without relatives’ knowledge or consent.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Investigators from the Ministry of Public Security are investigating reports that Shanxi Aurui Biomaterials had been involved in trading thousands of dead bodies or body parts, on suspicion that the company engaged in “theft of, insult to, or intentional destruction of human remains,” according to multiple news reports that followed up on Yi’s posts.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Yi had alleged that bodies were being sent to the company from funeral homes across Shanxi, Sichuan and Guangxi provinces, with thousands of bodies in Sichuan alone, and more than 70 families seeking redress. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Their bones were being used to create dental bone implants, and relatives couldn’t be sure the ashes they were receiving were indeed the complete remains of their loved ones, he wrote, quoting a fellow lawyer.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Later, after being warned off going public by officials from the Beijing Municipal Judicial Affairs, he posted: “I am willing to pay the price to expose this enraging truth.”</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">In an Aug. 13 official announcement, the Bureau said Yi would step down from his position as director of Beijing Yongzhe, which he founded. The firm didn’t immediately update its website, however, and Yi was still listed as a director on Wednesday morning.</span></p> <figure><img alt="ENG_CHN_BODY SNATCHERS_08142024.2.jpg" class="image-richtext image-inline" src="https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/dead-body-sales-lawyer-whistleblower-fired-08142024123533.html/eng_chn_body-snatchers_08142024-2-1.jpg/@@images/0fa04310-ac1d-4664-9135-f97c4f933ccb.jpeg" title="ENG_CHN_BODY SNATCHERS_08142024.2.jpg"/> <figcaption>Beijing lawyer Yi Shenghua is earlier shown as a director of the Beijing Yongzhe Law Firm (above), and is later replaced by Li Yinghong (below) on Aug. 14. (Beijing Yongzhe Law Firm website)<br/><br/></figcaption> </figure> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">An employee who answered the phone at Beijing Yongzhe on Wednesday appeared to confirm the move when contacted by RFA Mandarin.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Li Yinghong is now the director recognized by the Judicial Affairs Bureau,” the employee said, before handing the phone to a colleague.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Asked why Yi’s name was still listed on the firm’s website, the second colleague said: “The Bureau of Judicial Affairs’ version will definitely be more accurate than ours.”</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Soon afterward, Yi’s listing as director was removed from the firm’s website, and Li Yinghong’s name appeared in its place.</span></p> <p><b>‘Anyone who dares to expose’</b></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A Beijing-based lawyer who gave only the pseudonym Wang for fear of reprisals said Yi’s ouster was definitely linked to his whistle-blowing over the body-snatching case.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“The Beijing Municipal Judicial Affairs Bureau has a deputy director of the lawyers’ work guidance department called Zhu Yuzhu who has been behind the punishment of many lawyers and law firms in the past,” Wang said. “He was the architect of the July 9, 2015, political crackdown [on rights lawyers].”</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Now, it’s Yi Shenghua’s turn,” he said. “Yi’s exposure of the theft and sale of human bones was a meaningful act for society, but ... he is being punished by the Beijing Municipal Judicial Affairs Bureau.”</span><span style="font-weight: 400;"></span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Another lawyer who gave only the pseudonym Tan for fear of reprisals said Yi’s sacking highlights how little freedom of speech there is in China.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“It’s not just Yi Shenghua; journalists who exposed the </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrv78nG9R04"><span style="font-weight: 400;">gutter oil scandal</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> were also persecuted back then,” Tan said. “Anyone who dares to expose the dark side [of Chinese society] will be attacked and retaliated against.”</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Chinese censors have moved in tandem with the sacking of Yi Shenghua to minimize public discussion of the scandal.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">All of Yi’s Weibo posts about the body-snatching case have since been removed from the social media platform Weibo, along with much of the content and comment on the case.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">According to an in-depth follow-up from official media outlet </span><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">The Paper</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> that has since been deleted, the Taiyuan Public Security Bureau in the northern province of Shanxi sent the results of an investigation into the illegal sale of corpses to the state prosecutor for review and prosecution in May.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Shanxi Aorui stands accused of “illegally purchasing human remains and body parts from Sichuan, Guangxi, Shandong and other places for processing into bone grafts worth 380 million yuan (US$53 million) between January 2015 and July 2023,” </span><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">The Paper </span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">said.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">It said police had seized “more than 18 tonnes of human bones” and more than 34,000 articles of finished product from the company, and that one suspect identified only by his surname Su had arranged for more than 4,000 human remains to be stolen from four funeral homes in Yunnan, Chongqing, Guizhou and Sichuan between 2017 and 2019.</span></p> <p><b><i>Translated by Luisetta Mudie.</i></b></p>
- Content Type Text
- Language English
- NewsML Media Topics Arts, Culture, Entertainment and Media
- Subtitles / Dubbing Available No
- Rights (Weibo/@lawyeryishenghua)
- Network VOA
- Embargo Date August 14, 2024 13:18 EDT
- Byline By Huang Chun-mei for RFA Mandarin
- Brand / Language Service Voice of America - English