A Yi - A Perfect Crime

My lawyer silenced me and, with a feigned look of pain, sat back down.

The day’s session finished with the identification of the switchblade and other pieces of evidence. As the officers led me away, Kong Jie’s mother rushed over and scratched at my face. Her relatives followed behind and pinched me too. The officer grabbed my arm and dragged me off to stop me from charging back. I looked away as we left and saw Kong Jie’s mother kicking out like a naughty child, before collapsing in tears.

‘My girl, my girl!’

Everyone was trying to help her, but this worsened her tantrum.

It felt so ritualised. Maybe she felt she had to perform like this to prove she was a real mother. But I knew this wasn’t real suffering. Real suffering would break through in the moments she spent alone while looking at photos of her daughter. Even then, the grief wouldn’t produce tears, only a hollow feeling, as if her organs had been spooned out of her body.

The trial was over in a matter of days. My lawyer argued that the case should be treated as a matter of legal technicality, while the prosecutor contended this was premeditated murder in the first degree from which I had tried to abscond. It was straightforward logic. The judge agreed. He asked if I had anything to add; I said no.

A few days later I was led back into court. Everyone stood along with the judge as he relayed decision in his beautifully modulated voice. I was swimming in unfamiliar words; I could barely understand any of it. Just as I thought we were nearing a conclusion, he licked his finger and turned to a new page.

‘Just read the last sentence,’ I said.

He stopped and his glasses slid down his nose. The officer beside me kicked me in the shin.

Finally, the judge came to the verdict: the defendant was guilty of murder in the first degree.

Sentence: the death penalty.

Grievous bodily harm, fixed prison term of ten years.

Rape, eight years.

The judge had barely finished when I felt another sharp kick to the shin. I bent over in pain.

At least it was all finished. But then he started reading again. Now we came to the civil action brought by the victim’s family. The court had taken into account my economic circumstances and decided I was unable to pay compensation, so none was to be granted.

A thud sounded behind me as someone fell to their seat. In this instance the court had judged her rather than me. I did regret killing her daughter in some ways, but if I hadn’t committed a murder so intolerable to our hypocritical society, what would have been the point?

Two days later Ma came. She was still avoiding people and when they bumped into her she would say, ‘My son’s going to be dead soon too. I don’t owe anyone anything.’

She looked at me and placed a selection of different drinks and a large bag of roasted chicken wings before me.

‘Son, you were right. If you don’t eat well, there’s no point in making money.’ But there was a screen between us. She gestured at a guard as if he was a waiter. ‘These are for my son.’

‘I’m afraid all gifts must be registered.’

‘Then please register these for me.’

‘You have to do it yourself.’

Displeased, she put them back in her bag. ‘Son, if you want a bird’s nest or bear paw, Mama can get them for you. My money is worthless without you.’

‘Save it. You need it to start a new family.’

Yes, I was being cruel, but what else could I say? Ma’s tears burst forth like a fountain. It was the first time I’d ever seen her cry like that.

She cocked her head and said, ‘Mama is going to get you out.’

‘Impossible.’

‘I don’t believe that.’

I didn’t say anything. In one short month she’d become a stubborn ox. Maybe this was the first time in her life she really had something worth fighting for.

‘Wait,’ she said, grabbing her bag and striding out of the visitors’ room. After fifty metres she stopped, turned and called back, ‘You’ve lost so much weight.’

Ma came back two days later with a squat, bald lawyer.

‘I don’t understand, but you can explain it to my son.’

‘Here’s the thing, boy. We want to appeal on your behalf to the Supreme Court. But we need your consent.’

‘I’m not appealing.’

‘But it’s your right. Why wouldn’t you?’

‘I know.’

‘My name is Li, everyone knows me. Mr Li has got three men off death row.’

‘I know, but there’s no need.’

Ma beat at the glass, first with her hands and then with her head. I watched her eyes, nose and teeth contort as they came at me, before pulling back again.

‘Just some cooperation,’ she howled.

‘OK,’ I said, nodding.

But I started regretting it as soon as I got back to my cell. I was like a character in a novel who has gone to drown themselves in the sea but who meets an old friend on the beach and is kidnapped by the conversation.

I couldn’t tell my mother I wanted to die.

From then on, Ma and the lawyer came and left on a cloud of dust, too busy for niceties. I was the emperor and they were the loyal ministers. One day the lawyer arrived with an official document from the A—Province People’s Hospital, dated five years previously, which described the after-effects of a wound I had sustained to the head. Symptoms included headaches, hysteria and signs of neurosis. I told them it never happened.

‘We have the word of a doctor,’ the lawyer said, pulling out a transcript, on which was written:

Q: Did you write this medical record?

A: Yes.

Q: The proof?

A: That’s my signature.

‘I’ve never been to the People’s Hospital,’ I said.

He rapped on the counter, exasperated. I understood.

‘You listen to me from now on. Your answers are limited to yes or no. That’s it.’

I would say yes to everything. He was there to remind me of my story.

He looked satisfied, but before leaving he asked one more time, ‘Can you tell me why you were admitted to hospital?’

I didn’t know what to say. He looked disappointed.

‘Someone hit you on the head with a brick as you were walking through the night market during your New Year holidays.’

‘Right.’

‘You must remember your injuries.’

We were dicing with death here. I was under no illusions that there’d be a miracle, but my lawyer went on to outline the five potential lines of ‘escape’. He made it sound as if the death penalty was the least likely of outcomes.

1. Judicial appraisal.

2. Apportion some of the responsibility to society.

3. Change of date of birth.

4. That there was in fact no intent to commit rape.

5. A leniency plea based on having given myself up.

‘But I didn’t give myself up,’ I said.

‘Yes, you did,’ he replied firmly. ‘Upon your arrest you voluntarily made contact with the police. Before your arrest you wrote three options on three separate hundred-yuan notes. One of those was to give yourself up. Which means the intent was there. You also called your assistant class monitor Li Yong to tell him where you were. For a kid your age, the class monitor and assistant class monitors are the highest possible levels of authority. This shows your desire to repent to those in charge.’

‘I was fed up with the game.’

‘Which amounts to turning yourself in.’

My mother came back a few days later with a spring in her step. She was waving wildly with excitement. Anyone would think she had in her possession a paper granting my release.

‘You must thank your mother,’ the lawyer said. ‘I’ve never seen such persistence.’

‘What’s happened?’ I said.