Chapter 50 - 42: Application Rejected

The charge was excessive defense leading to intentional injury causing death?!

Everyone in the courtroom gave a slight nod. At the same time, their hearts sank and their brows furrowed, leaving them speechless for a long while.

At the defense table, Xu De was no more relaxed than they were.

He had come prepared with two plans before the trial began.

One: Win the courtroom debate, refute all of the prosecution’s arguments, and change the defendant Wang Qiang’s fate—from guilty to innocent!

But this was a courtroom.

And no one could ever be one hundred percent certain of victory.

So, he had a backup plan.

Two: The materials related to a letter of forgiveness and a settlement agreement.

These documents could, to a certain extent, reduce the defendant’s sentence, preventing a situation where failure to secure an acquittal would mean all his efforts were for nothing.

So the question was, why did Xu De feel he might lose the case and need to resort to his backup plan?

The reason was...

’Excessive defense...’

At the defense table.

Xu De took a deep breath, his brows knitting together. His eyes held a trace of unprecedented solemnity.

The prosecution had amended the indictment, changing the charge from intentional homicide to excessive defense.

For him, this was not good news.

Why?

Because an accusation must be supported by evidence to be proven true.

If intentional homicide was a skyscraper and excessive defense was a single-story home, then the evidence the prosecution held was a five-foot-deep foundation.

It couldn’t support a skyscraper.

But it was more than enough to support a single-story home!

And his goal was to prevent any structure from being built on this foundation at all!

Against a skyscraper, he could have used words alone, arguing the foundation was too weak and the building would collapse. But against a single-story home...

He would have to shatter the foundation completely.

’Tricky... This is very tricky.’

On the judge’s bench.

"Alright."

Zhang Bingxin nodded and looked away.

This hearing was focused on the criminal charges, so he had no intention of letting Chen Wei, who represented the civil suit, speak before that part was concluded.

Presiding Judge Zhang Bingxin turned to Xu De at the defense table and asked.

"Counsel for the defense, do you have any objections to the prosecution’s charge?"

As his words fell.

All eyes in the courtroom focused on Xu De.

Then, Xu De took a deep breath and declared in a solemn, heavy tone:

"Your Honor, we... object!"

After he spoke, he paused, then pulled a piece of evidence from the pile of documents on the table.

"Your Honor, this is a piece of evidence submitted by the prosecution: the murder weapon."

As he spoke, he handed the document to the court clerk.

The clerk was clearly accustomed to Xu De’s habit of using the prosecution’s own evidence.

After a brief inspection, the clerk handed it up to the bench. The three judges glanced down and saw a photograph of a curved, sickle-like blade printed on the paper.

"This is a sickle, one used for reaping wheat, and it is extremely sharp."

"Obviously, it does not belong to the defendant, Wang Qiang!"

Xu De rose to his feet.

With his opening words, he immediately distanced his client from the murder weapon.

In a criminal case, three questions are critical: who owned the weapon, how did it appear at the scene, and how was it used to take a life. If he could distance his client from the weapon, the ’progress bar’ for winning the case would shoot up!

"Your Honor, according to this forensic report, there are fingerprints from three different people on this murder weapon."

"One: Li Erniu. Two: Wang Qiang. And three... a villager from Li Family Village named Li Chunhua!"

"This Li Chunhua is the owner of the weapon. During the incident, while the police and villagers were in a standoff, he was standing in the crowd, holding this very sickle."

"So, how did this sickle get from Li Chunhua’s hands into Li Erniu’s, ultimately ending with Li Erniu being disemboweled by it?"

"The reason is that during the incident, as the defendant, Wang Qiang, was exercising his right to self-defense, he enraged the deceased, Li Erniu."

"Following that, Li Erniu, in a state of agitation, rage, and frenzy, snatched the sickle from Li Chunhua’s hands, intending to harm the defendant, Wang Qiang!"

Suddenly, Xu De’s eyes sharpened, and his tone grew just as cutting.

"At that moment, forced to defend himself, the defendant had no choice but to react defensively!"

"What followed is exactly what we stated during the first trial: the defendant was swallowed by the crowd, and when he was seen again, the victim, Li Erniu, was already dead!!!"

"Your Honor, members of the panel."

"The actions of the defendant, Wang Qiang, fall perfectly under Article 20 of the Criminal Law, defining justifiable self-defense. We request that the court dismiss the prosecution’s charges and find the defendant not guilty!"

Xu De’s words were clear and his logic was meticulous.

In just a few sentences, he made the course of events perfectly clear. Even those in the audience who hadn’t read the case file could now visualize the entire process in their minds.

In the gallery, hundreds of spectators nodded in thought.

On the bench, Judge Sun Dong also nodded and said in a low voice:

"That is indeed the case. It’s consistent with the testimony of the seven police officers."

At the same time, Sun Dong was inwardly impressed.

’A few sentences, and he’s tied together his thesis, his argument, the evidence, and the corroboration... Tsk, even the top lawyers from Yanjing would be hard-pressed to perform at this level.’

Zhang Bingxin nodded, but his face remained expressionless.

He turned his head to look at the prosecution.

At their table, the three prosecutors didn’t appear angry. Instead, they seemed quite calm and relaxed.

"Counsel for the prosecution, do you wish to rebut the defense’s statement?"

Prosecutor Hu Guang nodded. He turned to the defense table, his eyes meeting Xu De’s. After a moment of direct eye contact, he began to speak:

"Your Honor, members of the panel."

"What we would like to point out is..."

As he spoke, Hu Guang paused, then brought up an extremely fine detail that made everyone frown.

"The excessive nature of the defendant Wang Qiang’s defense is not demonstrated by his counterattack against the knife, but rather..."

"...in the actions he took when Li Erniu first got into the police car!"

As Hu Guang finished speaking, Wang Wei, at his side, immediately stood up, submitted several documents, and said:

"This is the police autopsy report."

"The report clearly indicates that the deceased, Li Erniu, had a very deep bite mark on the back of his hand!"

’A bite mark?’

Zhang Bingxin paused. He frowned, pinching the document as he fell into thought.

’What does this case... have to do with a bite mark!?’

"Your Honor, according to the testimony of the officers present inside the car,"

"when Li Erniu demonstrated his intent to forcibly abduct and assault Wang Mei, he was not immediately pushed out of the car by the defendant, Wang Qiang. Before that, the defendant took another action."

"He bit him!"

Wang Wei spoke. His heavyset frame didn’t look comical; on the contrary, it seemed imposing, and his expression was utterly solemn.

"The defendant first bit Li Erniu, causing him to cry out in pain!"

"And what followed is the crucial point."

"Because of the pain, Li Erniu let go..."

As he spoke, he submitted the written testimony from those same police officers.

The record was very clear. It was Wang Qiang’s bite that made the other man let go; otherwise, it would have been very difficult to make Li Erniu release his grip by simply shoving him.

But a sharp, painful stimulus can make a person’s muscles recoil reflexively!

And because Li Erniu had let go...

"At this point, he had already ceased his assault and showed no signs of making any other aggressive moves. At the same time, there were at least four police officers at his side who could have subdued him on the spot!"

Wang Wei’s expression was stern, his tone grave.

"And yet, in that situation, the defendant, Wang Qiang, took the initiative to attack again, pushing Li Erniu out of the car!"

"In conclusion, we argue that when there was a better way to handle the situation, and the deceased had not shown any secondary intent to assault..."

"...Wang Qiang chose to attack."

Justifiable self-defense has a key characteristic: the degree of the counterattack must be proportional to the degree of the assault, and one cannot press the attack after the threat has ended.

Li Erniu let go in pain.

Objectively, the threat had paused, and the police could have brought him under control. For Wang Qiang to attack again under these circumstances went beyond the scope of self-defense.

Therefore, from this perspective... both the degree and the timing of the counterattack were already pushing the boundaries of justifiable self-defense.

"This..."

In the gallery, the spectators’ brows furrowed, and their eyes filled with uncertainty.

A commotion began to stir in the gallery, and a clamor of discussion filled the air.

In the crowd.

"This is looking a little dicey..."

Wang Chao, sitting in his seat, rubbed his chin and spoke thoughtfully as he gazed at the front of the courtroom.

He hadn’t read the case file or witnessed the incident, but if the facts were truly as the prosecution described... then the claim of justifiable self-defense might not hold up.

Even if his actions inside the car were legal, there must have been other "suspected" instances of excessive force.

After all, Wang Qiang’s subjective emotional state at the time was too intense. Objectively, his actions were extremely similar to being ’intentional,’ meaning any of his counterattacks could be argued over.

"Are they going to have to use the evidence for sentence reduction they prepared ahead of time?" Wang Chao speculated.

Abandoning the not-guilty defense at this stage would actually be a decent option.

They could conserve their energy and focus on using evidence to reduce Wang Qiang’s sentence. At the very least, they could ’cut their losses.’

"Let’s just keep watching," Lin Yue whispered.

However...

"Furthermore..."

At the front of the courtroom.

Wang Wei was about to continue speaking, but before he could get the words out.

The next second.

An furious voice instantly shattered the courtroom’s proceedings.

"Fallacy! That’s a complete fallacy!"

"In both legal precedent and real-world experience, those were not two separate acts, but one single, continuous act of defense!"

"The prosecutor has just ignored the continued state of ’imminent danger’ that existed within a span of seconds! His argument is a fallacy, completely detached from reality, and it utterly fragments the continuous facts of the case!"

Suddenly, the defense counsel, Xu De, spoke out, his voice filled with fury as his eyes locked onto Wang Wei.

His mouth was like a machine gun, but it wasn’t firing bullets—it was spitting knives!

Upon hearing this, Wang Chao and Lin Yue, sitting in the gallery, raised their eyebrows slightly.

’Is he... not planning to give up? Is he still pushing for an acquittal?’

That was right.

At this moment, Xu De’s mind was incredibly clear. He didn’t even need to think; the words to refute his opponent’s argument formed instantly in his brain.

’The not-guilty defense... He was going to see it through to the end!’

"Slander! That’s slander!"

"Please respect the order of the court! We have not finished our statement."

At the prosecution table, Prosecutor Wang Wei snapped to his senses, rage burning within him as he fought to control his temper.

He hadn’t even finished his point, and what he was about to say was completely different from what the defense counsel was implying. He immediately growled:

"Counsel for the defense, you are taking my words out of context!"

But to his surprise, his opponent had no intention of engaging with him whatsoever.

"Your Honor."

Xu De ignored his opponent’s furious glare and turned to Presiding Judge Zhang Bingxin.

"The prosecution’s statements are full of personal exaggeration, subjective conjecture, and non-objective information! They are completely inconsistent with the facts!"

"Therefore, we move to..."

"...dismiss all charges brought by the prosecution against the defendant, Wang Qiang!"

In an instant, an atmosphere of intense, head-to-head confrontation filled the air.

At the same time, an exhilarating tension thick with the smell of gunpowder—the kind that gets the adrenaline pumping and the blood boiling—instantly flooded Courtroom Number One.