A man who beat his wife and children: netizens call for severe punishment and the loss of his guardianship

On 12 July 2019 the police received a report that a man in Donghai county, Jiangsu, had beaten his children with a stick. On 13 July the Donghai county public security bureau published a notice on its Weibo account, Ping'an Lianyungang, which read as follows.

On the evening of 12 July 2019 the Wenquan police station of the Donghai county public security bureau received a report that Ge, of Xilianwan village in Wenquan township, had beaten his children with a stick. The bureau took the report very seriously, immediately sent officers to investigate and quickly summoned Ge to the police station.

Investigation established that on 12 July the suspect, Ge (male, 36, of Xilianwan village, Wenquan township, Donghai county), had drunk continuously and had driven a motor vehicle while drunk. At home he beat his wife, Zhang (33), at random, and Zhang went out to escape. Ge then beat his daughter (8) and his son (13) with a stick in turn. During the beatings he made the children film each other, intending to send the video to his wife so as to coerce her into coming home; the video was afterwards forwarded and circulated. Doctors diagnosed minor injuries to Ge's wife and soft-tissue injuries in several places on the children's bodies.

Ge has been criminally detained by the public security authorities and the case is under further investigation. The authorities will keep the public informed of progress in the case in good time. Ge's children are now in the guardianship of their mother.

Netizens: severe punishment, and removal of his guardianship

In this case the man drove a motor vehicle while drunk, an offence under the Road Traffic Safety Law, and committed indiscriminate domestic violence, beating his wife, his eight-year-old daughter and his twelve-year-old son, which is suspected of the crimes of intentional injury, abuse, child abuse and insult.

The village party secretary of Xilianwan said that the man was addicted to alcohol, that after drinking he did not recognise even his parents, his wife or his children, and that he had often beaten his parents, his wife and the children. The village had intervened to mediate on several occasions and the police station had also spoken to him, but he would not mend his ways.

The children, the wife and the parents all lived under his long oppression, and one can imagine how much mental and physical harm they suffered. As netizens said, there is no need for such a family to continue. The two children might well be better off without a father of that kind. Many netizens hoped that his guardianship could be revoked.

Comments from Weibo users

In what circumstances may a parent's guardianship be revoked?

Guardianship is the status right by which a guardian supervises and protects the personal and property interests of a person without capacity or with limited capacity for civil conduct, such as a minor or a person suffering from mental illness.

In December 2014 the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security and the Ministry of Civil Affairs jointly issued the Opinions on Several Issues concerning the Handling in Accordance with Law of Acts by Guardians Infringing on the Rights and Interests of Minors, which identify seven circumstances in which a guardian's qualification may be revoked by judgment:

(1) sexual abuse of a minor, or selling, abandoning, abusing or violently injuring a minor, seriously damaging the minor's physical and mental health;

(2) leaving a minor without supervision or care, so that the minor faces a danger of death or serious injury, and failing to correct the conduct after being educated;

(3) refusing to perform guardianship duties for six months or more, so that the minor is left homeless or without means of support;

(4) being unable properly to perform guardianship duties because of drug taking, gambling, long-term alcoholism or other bad habits, or being unable to perform them because of serving a sentence, and refusing to entrust the duties in part or in whole to another person, so that the minor is in difficulty or danger;

(5) coercing, luring or using a minor to beg, and failing to correct the conduct after three or more criticisms and educations by the public security authorities, the minor rescue and protection agencies and other departments, seriously affecting the minor's normal life and study;

(6) instigating or using a minor to commit unlawful or criminal acts, where the circumstances are flagrant;

(7) other acts seriously infringing the lawful rights and interests of a minor.

Who has the right to apply to a people's court to revoke a guardian's qualification?

(1) the minor's other guardians, namely grandparents, elder brothers and sisters, and close relatives and friends;

(2) the villagers' or residents' committee of the place where the minor lives, and the work unit of the minor's father or mother;

(3) the civil affairs departments and the minor rescue and protection agencies they establish;

(4) the Communist Youth League, the women's federation, the working committee for the care of the next generation, schools and other bodies and units.

What to do when domestic violence occurs

Nothing about domestic violence is a small matter, and no small number of women and children are destroyed by it. According to statistics of the All-China Women's Federation, 30 per cent of the 270 million households in the country have seen a married woman subjected to domestic violence, and on average a woman is beaten by her husband every 7.4 seconds. Other data show that domestic violence against children has a high incidence but a low detection rate: children's minds are immature, they do not know how to seek protection when it happens, and it is therefore hard to discover.

A child who grows up amid domestic violence readily develops defects of character, appearing inferior, pessimistic, bullying towards the weak or timid, and the rates of suicide and crime among such children are higher than in normal families. As many as 70 per cent of them carry domestic violence into their own families when they grow up.

Domestic violence is not a family matter. When facing it, or when seeing another person subjected to it, one may take up the law to protect one's own or another's lawful rights and interests. The Anti-Domestic Violence Law of the People's Republic of China was adopted at the 18th session of the Standing Committee of the 12th National People's Congress on 27 December 2015 and came into force on 1 March 2016. It provides expressly that:

1. A victim of domestic violence, and the victim's legal representative or close relatives, may complain to, report to or seek help from the perpetrator's or the victim's work unit, the residents' committee, the villagers' committee, the women's federation or another unit. A unit that receives such a complaint, report or request for help shall give assistance and deal with it.

2. A victim of domestic violence, and the victim's legal representative or close relatives, may also report the matter to the public security authorities or bring a suit before a people's court in accordance with law.

3. Where a school, kindergarten, medical institution, residents' committee, villagers' committee, social work service agency, rescue management agency, welfare agency or any member of their staff discovers in the course of work that a person without capacity or with limited capacity for civil conduct is or appears to be suffering domestic violence, it shall report the matter to the public security authorities without delay. The public security authorities shall keep the informant's information confidential.

4. On receiving a report of domestic violence the public security authorities shall send officers without delay, stop the violence, investigate and collect evidence in accordance with the relevant provisions, and assist the victim to obtain medical treatment and an assessment of the injury.

5. Legal aid agencies shall provide legal aid to victims of domestic violence in accordance with law.

6. Where a party applies to a people's court for a personal safety protection order because it has suffered domestic violence or faces a real danger of it, the court shall accept the application.

7. A unit or individual that discovers domestic violence in progress has the right to dissuade the perpetrator without delay.