China: Illicit Drug Dealers Executed

[BA]

Six people were executed on Wednesday for their drug related crimes, the No 2 Intermediate People's Court of Beijing announced yesterday.

The intermediate court held a press conference to say that the executions were carried out on the order of the Supreme People's Court of China.

Zheng Fuxing was the only one among the six executed who was not a trafficker but a maker of drugs.

Zheng was the chief druggist of a pharmaceutical factory in Fujian Province, East China, and he used his expertise to produce narcotic pills in the factory.

The five drug traffickers were Li Shuying, Zhao Zhimin, Ali, Dong Yingdong and Ma Wenqiong. Three of them were women. Four more drug traffickers were sentenced to death with two-year probation.

The Beijing No 1 Intermediate People's Court also sentenced seven drug traffickers yesterday.

A Uygur woman from the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region was sentenced to death with probation. Two were sentenced to life imprisonment; three to 15 years in jail, and one to five years. Most of the convicts are from Xinjiang.

A total of 311 criminals involved in 263 drug-related cases were punished by Beijing-based courts from January to last month, according to sources.

At a press conference to recognize International Anti-Drug Day, Vice-President of the Beijing Higher People's Court Wang Ming warned the city needs to do more to fight drugs.

According to the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Public Security, there are 28,000 registered addicts in the capital.

Still, "a large quantity of drugs is reaching different segments of society," Wang said.

Moreover, crimes related to newer types of drugs, such as ecstasy and chloramine ketone, are emerging, said Wang.

In Shanghai, local police yesterday announced they had recently apprehended an Uzbek group suspected of drug trafficking, and had seized 3.15 kilograms of heroin.

The group of five, three men and two women, swallowed heroin pills wrapped in plastic bags. One man, whose name has not been identified, died of heroin poisoning after the bag broke inside his body.

"It is believed to be the first case in China where a Central Asian group has been involved in drug trafficking," said Fang Dinghua with the Shanghai Public Security Bureau.

Early in April, local police had obtained some leads about the group. By late May, police got word that the five went to Southwest China's Yunnan Province from Beijing, and then arrived in Shanghai one day later.

www.chinadaily.com
6/27/03

 

[SilverFeniks]

As many problems as the US, etc. have, China remains the most backward power in the world ... talk about no civil rights whatsoever ...

A Uygur woman from the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region was sentenced to death with probation

there's some compassionate conservatism for ya

there are 28,000 registered addicts in the capital.

Why would you register as an addict?
Wouldn't that instantly get you a 20-year sentence in a forced-labor camp or something? 8(

 

[E-llusion]

Zheng was the chief druggist

Christ ! First they make this guy a chief druggist and then they wonder why he started making good pills ?? 8(

On a serious note, I think china may have a much bigger drug problem on their hands than they care to admit.

There is over 1 Billion people living there and always there will be a % of ppl into recreational drug use, however because of the scrwed up commie regime they have, most of the "bad" info is suppresed and no one knows about it....

 

[Roman Holiday]

Moreover, crimes related to newer types of drugs, such as ecstasy and chloramine ketone, are emerging, said Wang.

What the fuck is "chloramine ketone?" I googled it and only got this article as a result. I'm no chemist and I'm curious.

 

[Morrison's Lament]

Well, I live here so maybe I can give a few insights, sorry if this rambles on but it's gonna be a general assessment of the situation here since I assume I'm the only Bluelighter currently living on the mainland (if not, PM me!).

There is surprisingly little drug use apparent in China, especially here in Beijing. This may be because everyone knows about the potential for death penalty, in fact six people would not warrant a story if they weren't foreigners. Several thousand people are executed here some years, and no one knows how many die in custody.

The Uyghurs are often singled out, they have the connections in Xinjiang which is where the shit comes through (it has pourus boarders with countries like Afghanistan). They are also Muslim separatists and the government suspects they are using the profits to fund some sort of anti-Chinese Jihad movement, there are bus bombings and other seemingly random attacks with some regularity.

Not surprisingly, the lack of regulation (and enforcement) in the pharmaceutical industry means there is a shitload of people setting up factories mostly to make illegal or semi-illegal things. Ketamine was a big business untill '99, you could walk into a "pharmacy" that usually specialized in sketchy shit like this, and purchase as much quantity as you liked for a ridiculously low price. This was then smuggled out to places where it was actually worth something.

There are some companies doing this with RC's now, I saw an advertisement from one chemical supply warehouse that simply said: "Tryptamines and Phenethylamines for sale!" and without noting that they sold anything else. No one is gonna tell me that's a legitimate company

Basically, some people have been able to get away with crazy shit here, but when it catches up to them... well, sucks to be them, to put it mildly.

The executions in the eighties, not sure if this is as common today, were spectacle. Dealers had signs around their necks that said : "I betrayed the Chinese people!" and were marched through a crowd of people to a public execution spot, in the seventies they used sports stadiums as their favorite location for these events.

The public executions were pretty bad press, so no one will tell me any info about where and when I could see one, but the general agreement is it still happens in many provinces, just not as openly. I saw a photo series once from a journalist that was allowed to watch a dozen or so people shot outside a prison in some province, maybe Fujian or Shandong, don't remember.

They basically tied their hands behind their backs, blindfolded and marched them over a hill, then shot them and buried the bodies there.

So here it IS true - Drugs DO kill!

That being said, there are a lot of great things about China. People are nice, and generally speaking if you don't mess with anyone no one messes with you. The reality for the locals is somewhat different, as corrupt local officials are always a problem, justice is hard to administer from a distance and a lot of outlying provinces have to deal with extremely nasty governance.

Thakfully, a large portion of those being executed these days are being executed for corruption. That is also a capital offence here, which is frankly a novel idea that I have a hard time objecting to (despite my general distaste for the death penalty). One might even say the war against drugs has taken a backseat to the war on corruption, as while local officials are not co-operating the drug war cannot work.

I've enjoyed my time here, despite having to switch to alcohol as a drug of choice for fear of my life, and recommend anyone visit. Moving later this month will, however, be long overdue. I need drugs damnit!

--- G.

 

[SilverFeniks]

Thanks for the insight G

 

[E-llusion]

Morrison's Lament,

Wow ! That's some scary shit, I'd do anything to NOT to live in China, I feel for you dude, to be afraid for your life just because of the life (drug) choices one would make is some scary ass shit...

 

[Morrison's Lament]

Actually I'm staying clean of the illegal stuff and feeling like shit these days because I drink too much alcohol and chain smoke cigarettes

It's a nice place, except for the absence of drugs, and I travel a lot and try to say high every minute I am out of the country

--- G.

 

[JTMarlin]

"It is believed to be the first case in China where a Central Asian group has been involved in drug trafficking," said Fang Dinghua with the Shanghai Public Security Bureau

Okay, and I'm supposed to believe some communists who put the words "The People's" in front of everything and try to keep anything not related to their ideology from ever existing. Six people is nothing in a country so big they have to restrict birth, hell I'd expect them to have a quota of about 200 executions daily as a population control measure.

 

[Morrison's Lament]

There isn't actually any major population boom problem, they are relaxing the regulations every year and I know several people that simply went ahead and had more children. The reason is that first of all you pay a fine that is easily managable for the middle and upper class, and the enduring punishment is that you don't get free social security and insurance for the extra kids, which you don't get for ANY kids in the U.S. anyway, and in most cases you don't get it here unless you are part of a work unit and a member of a work unit doesn't have the cash to pay the fee anyway.

The reason is that it is proven that educated professionals tend to have less children on average than poorer people, so allowing them to do so won't mean any huge population boom but keeps the middle class growing through inheritance and passed on opportunities for education.

Now, there are more executions here than anywhere else in the world, I don't dispute that, and I totally disagree with the death penalty on principle. However, that doesn't mean everything reported is part of some evil plot, in fact public scruitiny has increased so much that any accusation of under-reporting such as in the case of SARS is extremely damaging to the government.

The whole episode was a disaster, not because of the disease, but because the people learned they had been lied to. And that is something they cannot afford to repeat.

But I guess this is turning a bit too political

--- G.