Niu Tengyu’s mother: Guangdong High Court goes back on its word again—promised in May that all case files could be reviewed, then suddenly changed its tune in July!

My son Niu Tengyu was framed by the Guangdong Provincial Political and Legal Affairs Commission and wrongfully sentenced to 14 years. On July 1, his father again went to the Guangdong High Court to demand that the wrongful conviction be corrected, and stated: Niu Tengyu would never confess without any evidence, and demanded an in-person cross-examination with the judges handling the case at the Maoming Intermediate People’s Court, with the judges producing sufficient evidence.

The Guangdong High Court said at the time that it would hold an internal meeting to study the matter and provide a formal response on July 6.

However, because Zhang Haibo, president of the Guangdong High Court, had repeatedly deceived and set traps for us under the direction of the Guangdong Provincial Political and Legal Affairs Commission, I had long since held no illusions about the High Court’s promises. Sure enough, on July 6, the High Court replied that the evidence of Niu Tengyu’s crimes was conclusive, that the judgment itself could serve as evidence, and that the court would not arrange a meeting with Niu Tengyu to present the evidence of his crimes.

But the judgment does not list any specific evidence anywhere in its text, merely repeating the conclusion that he was “guilty.” Niu Tengyu’s father immediately retorted: “Then I demand to review all the case files and see whether there is any genuine evidence proving that Niu Tengyu is guilty.”

Yet the High Court replied that appeal materials had to be submitted first and that the case files could not be reviewed in their entirety.

Several months ago, we had already submitted an application to the High Court to review the case files. At first, the Guangdong authorities refused on the grounds that “the case files were taken away by Zhang Shuming and are not in the archives.” Later, they said that the case files had been found, but then invoked a so-called “administrative order of the five ministries and commissions,” claiming that after the conclusion of the second-instance proceedings, the case files no longer had to be provided to the parties. After we pointed out that this practice was clearly illegal, the High Court, knowing that it was in the wrong, changed its position and said that it could provide the case files, but only in part, because they involved “someone’s confidential information” that could not be disclosed.

The purpose of this approach is obvious: they will inevitably mix the key contents that favor overturning the wrongful conviction and could prove the framing and fabrication of evidence with the so-called “confidential information,” and refuse to disclose them. In the end, what they give us will be an incomplete, unclear and meaningless set of case files.

What is even more infuriating and absurd is that during my rights-defense efforts in Guangdong this May, Ma Jianbing, a High Court judge, explicitly conveyed on behalf of President Zhang Haibo that the Guangdong High Court allowed the review of all the case files; regardless of whether they involved confidential information, even confidential sections could be reviewed. Yet on July 6, that same judge, Ma Jianbing, changed his position and said that confidential sections could not be reviewed.

Such contradictions and repeated reversals are coming from the Guangdong Provincial High People’s Court. This once again confirms that my original decision not to believe any promise made by the High Court was completely correct. At this point, the facts have proved that not a single word spoken by the Guangdong Political and Legal Affairs Commission or the High Court is worthy of trust. Regardless of the rank of the official they are dealing with, they will use deception, set traps, make false promises and go back on their word. As long as I have one breath left in me, I will steadfastly continue seeking redress to the very end, until Niu Tengyu regains his freedom!