On December 17, China Women’s News reported on changes to prisoner probation rules in Beijing that mean women who’ve committed crimes after experiencing domestic violence can be released earlier.

Li Ling, deputy chief procurator of Haidian District People’s Procuratorate, said that, though an April 2001 Marriage Law amendment banned domestic violence in China for the first time, there are insufficient mechanisms in place to prevent and respond to it, and it is still not recognized in court as a mitigating factor for crimes by survivors of it.

In January, Beijing Municipal Higher People’s Court, People’s Procuratorate, Public Security Bureau, Justice Bureau and Prison Administration said they would relax parole criteria for older people, youths and abused women.

On October 1, they issued details that said the cases of people convicted of negligence (excluding hit-and-run drivers), people who have acted in self defense, and women who have committed crimes against men who had abused them would be considered more leniently in parole rulings.

They can be released on probation on condition that they have completed half of their sentence with good behavior or two thirds of their sentence with leave to request parole.

Li said women who experience long-term domestic violence sometimes become offenders themselves through feelings of desperation and helplessness, and 10 percent of those in Beijing prisons had committed murder.

Although this was still murder, Li said such violence was only directed towards their abusers and did not pose a threat to anyone else, so giving them early parole accords with the spirit of the law – to punish and rehabilitate criminals and to prevent crime.

Zhao Shuhua, director of Beijing Municipal Women’s Federation’s Rights and Interests Department, said imprisonment of such women deprived their children of maternal care, and that releasing them early benefits their families.

However, she emphasized that all criminals should receive penalties, no matter what the reason for their offense. The current priority should be to establish interventions that enhance public awareness of domestic violence and confer power to provide help to its survivors on local governments, social organizations, charities and communities.

(China.org.cn by Zhang Tingting, December 23, 2005)