context: The news of corruption in the public security bureau of Shunde District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province shocked the public. The bureau is being challenged for not having jurisdiction, and transferring C¥300 million worth of bank deposits of a live streaming enterprise and its shareholders in Wuhan to its own account in April 2024. Such predatory action is far from uncommon. Experts suggest including changes to fines and confiscating revenue management system in the new round of fiscal and tax reforms.
Correcting the use of administrative and criminal powers to intervene in economic disputes was noted at CPC Central Committee Political Bureau meeting on 30 July.
Wan Yi 万毅 Sichuan University Law School professor names several major manifestations of predatory law enforcement
- case handing organs in different places competing for jurisdiction
- fabricating informants or other facts in order to obtain jurisdiction over a case
- unreasonably splitting a case that should have been under the jurisdiction of the public security and judicial organs of other regions into several cases, so that they can conduct investigations into one of the cases on their own initiative
- threatening defendants and their families with restricting defendants' personal freedom for their 'voluntary payment of damages'
- illegally expanding the scope of sealing, seizure and freezing
Using law enforcement as a tool to extract money from private firms with departmental or local interests as the goal will deal a devastating blow to the state-business relationship and the business environment.
The key to tackling predatory law enforcement is
- disconnecting local fiscal revenue increases from fines and confiscations they get
- increases in local fiscal revenue may raise incomes of local civil servants, including staff of organs with responsibilities to supervise law enforcement activities
- disconnecting operating funds of law enforcement authorities from fines and confiscations they get
- disconnecting the performance assessment of law enforcement authorities from fines and confiscations they get
In addition, action should also be taken in
- enhancing information disclosure to ensure the public's right to know where the fines go and how they are used
- improving internal supervision mechanisms of law enforcement agencies