The presiding judge responds to the five main focuses of the case!, Mou Linhan's abuse case was sentenced to death in the first instance | Mou Linhan | Response
The highly publicized Mou Linhan abuse case was pronounced in the first instance of the Haidian District People's Court in Beijing on June 15th. The court ultimately sentenced the defendant Mou Linhan to three years and two months in prison for the crime of abuse, and also ordered him to compensate the plaintiff Cai in the incidental civil lawsuit for various economic losses totaling more than RMB 730000.
After the verdict was pronounced, the presiding judge in this case answered questions from reporters from the Rule of Law Daily regarding the focus of public attention.
The 1. asked: Does the defendant Mou Linhan constitute intentional homicide?
A: The court held that the evidence in the case was not sufficient to prove that Mou Linhan had actively pursued or allowed the victim's death to occur. Judging from the process of Mou Linhan's contact, search and treatment of Chen Moumou, it is shown that Mou Linhan does not want or allow Chen Moumou's death to appear, and there is no intentional delay in treatment.
2. asked: Is the relationship between the defendant Mou Linhan and Chen Moumou a family member in the sense of the crime of abuse?
Answer: According to the provisions of Article 260 of the Criminal Law of our country and the spirit of legislation, the crime of abuse refers to the use of beating and scolding, freezing and starvation, forced excessive labor, no treatment for illness, restriction of freedom, and humiliation. Family members who are physically and mentally tortured and tortured, and the circumstances are bad. The crime of abuse is a typical crime of domestic violence, and the definition of the scope of the subject of the crime of abuse should be consistent with the definition of the subject of the the People's Republic of China Anti-Domestic Violence Law.
In this case, Mou Linhan and Chen formed a substantial family member relationship. Firstly, from the perspective of the relationship and emotional development between Mou Linhan and Chen after establishing a boyfriend girlfriend relationship, the purpose of their romantic relationship is to jointly build a family; Secondly, a series of objective behaviors can also confirm that Mou Linhan and Chen are indeed preparing to form a family together; Once again, in terms of the attitudes and requirements of both parents towards Mou Linhan and Chen, it is an attitude towards the prospective son-in-law and a requirement towards the prospective daughter-in-law; Fourthly, since the establishment of their boyfriend and girlfriend relationship, Mou Linhan and Chen often live together, purchase household items to decorate their homes, engage in household activities together, and create a shared living atmosphere; Fifthly, after establishing a boyfriend girlfriend relationship, Mou Linhan and Chen had frequent economic exchanges, which were used for their living expenses.
Therefore, Mou Linhan and Chen not only have a subjective willingness to live together, but also objectively reflect that they have a relatively stable fact of living together, and are spiritually dependent and economically supportive of each other, based on the time of meeting their parents, the words and actions of both parents, the location, frequency, duration of their shared residence, and the economic expenses of both parties. The joint residence and other behaviors between Mou Linhan and Chen constitute the fundamental fact of the common life of the substantive family member relationship. The premarital cohabitation relationship between the two should be recognized as a family member relationship in the crime of abuse, and Mou Linhan meets the criminal subject requirements of the crime of abuse.
The 3. asked: Does the insulting behavior of the defendant Mou Linhan against Chen Moumou belong to the abuse in the crime of abuse and reach the level of abominable circumstances?
A: according to the general theory of criminal law, the anti domestic violence law and the normative documents issued by the highest judicial organ, it is believed that the use of insults, abuse and other means to destroy and torture the spirit of family members is a typical domestic violence with the nature of abuse, and it is more frequent in practice.
In this case, the establishment of the boyfriend girlfriend relationship between Mou Linhan and Chen was voluntary by both parties, without any external coercion or deception factors. During the process of socializing and living together after the establishment of the above relationship, the level of mutual spiritual dependence between the two parties continued to deepen. However, Mou Linhan was always entangled in Chen's past sexual experiences and believed that this was something Chen owed him. However, he was unwilling to break up with Chen as a result and still regarded Chen as his future life partner. In the process of getting along with Chen, Mou Linhan was unable to unravel the emotional knot caused by Chen's sexual experience. As a result, he became dissatisfied and, in order to vent his negative emotions towards Chen, he used verbal criticism, verbal abuse, and insults to create and continuously strengthen Chen's sense of debt towards him, in exchange for his own psychological balance. From January 2019 to September 2019, Mou Linhan frequently, for a long time, and persistently accused, insulted, and insulted Chen, using harsh language and vulgar content, causing significant psychological harm to Chen. Chen is unwilling to break up with Mou Linhan, but he doesn't know how to deal with the mental violence repeatedly imposed by Mou Linhan. Under the accumulation of mental violence over time, Chen suffered tremendous psychological pressure and extreme mental devastation and torment. In fact, the act of self harm through wrist amputation and suicide by taking excessive medication is an example.
Therefore, the court believes that in terms of the content of the insulting language, the frequency, duration, and consequences of the insulting behavior, Mou Linhan's insulting behavior towards Chen has constituted abusive behavior in the crime of abuse, and has reached a level of severity.
The 4. asked: Is there a causal relationship in criminal law between the abusive behavior of the defendant Mou Linhan against Chen and the result of Chen's suicide?
Answer: The court held that in the process of Chen's mental state deteriorating, extreme behaviors and eventual suicide, Mou Linhan's repeated high-frequency, long-term, and persistent insults are the decisive factors that create Chen's suicide risk and continuously strengthen and increase the risk. Therefore, it has a causal relationship with the harmful consequence of Chen's suicide.
After establishing a romantic relationship with Chen, Mou Linhan should have treated each other equally, handled them calmly and rationally, and resolved their emotional issues based on goodwill in their interactions and shared lives. However, Mou Linhan, due to his paranoid mentality, was unable to properly deal with the other party's past sexual experiences. He constantly used this as a means of accusing and insulting the other party, using malicious language to gradually push Chen, who had a high degree of mental dependence on him, towards the critical point of mental breakdown.
In this case, after establishing a romantic relationship with Mou Linhan, Chen's spiritual dependence on Mou Linhan continued to deepen. Mou Linhan insulted and insulted him for a long time due to his virginity, subjected him to mental torture and suppression, and degraded his personality. In order to maintain his romantic relationship with Mou Linhan, although Chen also resisted and argued, he ultimately chose to compromise, remain silent, and endure Mou Linhan's negative emotions. The content of the posts posted on Zhihu during his return to Dongguan, Guangdong, two months before his suicide by taking medication, truthfully reflected the mental torture he suffered due to Mou Linhan's accusations and insults, as well as his contradictory mentality of being at a loss in the face of Mou Linhan's dual personality; According to Mou Linhan's own confession on the reasons and process of the argument between the two sides on October 9, 2019, it can be confirmed that it was precisely because Mou Linhan said that Chen relied too much on his words, which deeply stimulated Chen's already fragile mental state, leading to Chen's emotional breakdown and crying. The risk of Chen's extremely fragile mental state at the time of the incident was created by Mou Linhan's accumulated accusation and insulting behavior over time. Mou Linhan, as the creator of this risk and a member of the community who has a close relationship and a certain obligation of assistance with Chen, was able to clearly recognize that Chen is already in a high-risk state of mental fragility. He should have timely paid attention to Chen's mental condition, taken effective measures to eliminate the above risk state in a timely manner, and prevented him from experiencing extreme situations again, even though Chen has already suffered from wrist amputation and self harm, and undergone gastric lavage treatment after taking excessive medication. But Mou Linhan turned a blind eye to the risk state created by him, and continued to repeatedly accuse and insult Chen, which strengthened and escalated Chen's fragile high-risk state. Combined with the stimulating words on the day of the incident, it ultimately led to the tragedy of Chen's suicide by taking medication.
Meanwhile, before establishing a romantic relationship with Mou Linhan, Chen had an outgoing and outgoing personality; But after establishing a romantic relationship with Mou Linhan, due to constantly being criticized and insulted by Mou Linhan, he often suffered from mental fatigue, low mood, and extreme situations such as wrist amputation and self harm, taking excessive medication and being treated with gastric lavage. At the time of just over a year of establishing a romantic relationship, he chose to take medication to commit suicide. It is evident that Mou Linhan's long-term mental repression behavior has caused Chen to feel a constant loss of self and dignity, gradually losing his expectations for a better life. The WeChat content sent by Chen before taking medication to commit suicide also strongly confirms that Mou Linhan's long-term mental torture has led to Chen's erroneous judgment of self-worth.
5. asked: Did the defendant Mou Linhan ever commit physical violence during the abuse of Chen Moumou?
Answer: The court held that based on the evidence in the case, it was difficult to determine the cause of the injuries on Chen Moumou's body, and it was impossible to determine that Mou Linhan had committed physical violence against Chen Moumou.
According to the evidence in the case, regarding whether physical violence was committed, Mou Linhan only admitted to lightly waving the other party's arm during an argument with Chen, which was far from the level of physical violence required for the crime of abuse; The testimony of two witnesses about Chen being beaten by Mou Linhan was transmitted as evidence, not a fact witnessed by the two of them, and lacks objective evidence to support it; In this case, witness Li also mentioned in his testimony that Chen claimed that the bruises and injuries on his body were caused by his own fall; And multiple other witnesses in the case stated that they had not seen any bruises or injuries on Chen's body, or heard that Chen had been beaten by Mou Linhan; The testimony of witness Cai, as well as the admission medical examination and hospitalization nursing records, can confirm that Chen had scattered bruises on both upper limbs and bruises on the lower limbs during hospitalization treatment. However, it cannot be confirmed what caused the above-mentioned bruises and bruises, nor can it be ruled out that Mou Linhan caused them during the rescue process of Chen at the hospital on the same day.
