Li Qiaochu: The 487th day since Xu Zhiyong and I applied to marry without success — a report on the situation

October 16, 2026     An update on developments.

The government information disclosure request I submitted on September 6, 2026—seeking disclosure of information about the four staff members on August 25, as well as the preservation status of the audio and video from the on-site law enforcement body cameras—is directly related to my procedural right to require the prison to issue a written denial so that I can exercise my right to seek redress.

The statutory deadline for responding to this information disclosure request expires on October 12, 2028. The prison has neither responded nor notified me of an extension; this is a complete failure to respond. I have therefore filed for administrative reconsideration, requesting confirmation that its failure to respond was unlawful and an order requiring it to respond. The reconsideration authority acknowledged receipt of the application on October 15.

There is one more matter. At the end of July 2026, I submitted an information disclosure request to the prison concerning regulations on outdoor time. Although I did not receive a written response from the prison at the end of August, I received a letter from Xu Zhiyong confirming that outdoor time had improved, so I did not want to pursue the matter further.

But on September 10, 2026, I suddenly received the prison’s response to this request—and the way the response was handled crossed a line:

First, they directly changed the receipt date shown in the EMS system from August 1 to August 5, completely disregarding the legal significance of “the date of receipt” under the Regulations on the Disclosure of Government Information. They simply picked whatever date they wanted.

Second, the response was dated September 2, but was not mailed until September 9. So what is the standard for “issuing a response”? The relevant judicial interpretation of the Supreme People’s Court and the reasoning of numerous administrative reconsideration decisions are that, before the response deadline expires, an administrative agency must complete the preparation of its response and complete its external service (or hand it over to the postal service for mailing). If a date written on a document is all that counts, does that mean the date can simply be filled in afterward at will?

The statutory deadline for disclosing information is a mandatory rule designed to constrain administrative agencies and protect applicants. I could not turn a blind eye to the prison’s flagrant violation, so on September 12 I lodged a complaint with the Shandong Provincial Department of Justice.

On September 21, the Department of Justice forwarded the complaint to the Shandong Provincial Prison Administration Bureau. I had requested supervisory review of the prison’s administrative conduct in handling an information disclosure request, but it was processed as a petition and referral. The process is slow and will not result in any substantive supervisory correction.

While I was waiting for the petition to be handled, on October 12, 2026, the prison once again rendered the statutory deadline meaningless.