"Judge, my brother is right, we're truly being wronged!"

"We only blocked the door and didn't do anything else. We had entered only once before, and we would never dare to commit anything illegal or disorderly!"

"Yes, Officer Qian Jiang from the town's police station had warned us before, saying that smashing the door was illegal."

"This time, we were just standing at the door, not doing anything. How could such a trivial matter result in years of imprisonment?"

"..."

One by one, people stood up, adamant in their defense, claiming their actions were confined to blocking the door. They maintained they hadn't committed any other illegal or disorderly acts and refused to accept the prosecution's charges.

This scene left the legal aid lawyer trembling with rage, his face turned ashen.

「Several days before.」

He had received this assigned case for legal aid. Since the defendants hadn't sought a lawyer voluntarily, it was common for an appointed legal aid attorney to help with the defense. After receiving the case, he had started preparing actively, looking into the case details and searching for conditions favorable to the defendants. He had also prepared a feasible sentence reduction plan. He wasn't confident they could reduce the sentence by years, but reducing it by a few months wouldn't have been a problem.

However, the scene during the plea phase of the hearing dealt him a heavy blow. It wasn't just Chen Daoguang; none of the other defendants cooperated with him. All of them refused to plead guilty, pushing the case towards a not-guilty defense.

Thinking about this, he was close to crying. He was just an ordinary legal aid attorney. His basic skills were merely average. And this was an ironclad case; even a deity couldn't win it, let alone him.

BANG—

「Ten minutes later.」

After Zhou Quanmin and the others had listened to the defendants' pleas, he summed up in a grave tone, "After deliberation by the collegial panel, the current point of contention in the case is that the defendants, including Chen Daoguang, maintain their innocence."

"Next, the hearing will focus on this point for trial."

As soon as he finished speaking, the legal aid attorney's face grew even more unsightly. His scalp tingled, and his future seemed bleak.

"Now, we enter the phase of presenting evidence and cross-examination."

Subsequently, from the prosecutor's bench, a prosecutor stood up and began to submit evidence.

"Here are the videos and photographs provided by Chen Qi's family on that day, along with the appraisal certificate for their authenticity. This material clearly shows Chen Daoguang and others engaged in illegal detention and provoking disturbances throughout the entire day of the 14th."

"This is the testimony from local villagers about the incident."

"This is the testimony from the Chen Qi family."

"Here is the medical assessment certificate for Chen Qi's younger son, who was slapped by Chen Daoguang when he wanted to go out and play."

"Here we have the case files from when Chen Daoguang and others illegally entered Song Yun's agritainment and smashed the door."

"Here is the evidence of Chen Daoguang organizing villagers multiple times for group disturbances..."

One piece of evidence after another was submitted to the collegial panel. All these pieces of evidence had been verified by professional appraisal agencies, confirming their authenticity.

Moreover, it was confirmed that Chen Daoguang had slapped and beaten the detained individuals during the illegal detention. There were also records from the town's police station showing that Chen Daoguang had organized unlawful assemblies and caused disturbances multiple times.

This evidence—each piece was as solid as a mountain. Many of them had been found by the two prosecutors working overnight. Based on this evidence, the sentencing recommendation for Chen Daoguang had also been adjusted accordingly; his offenses constituted serious provocation of disturbances. According to the law, he would be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no less than five years but no more than ten years.

"Defense, do you have any objections to this evidence?"

After reviewing the evidence, Zhou Quanmin looked back at the defense bench. Naturally, his focus was on the legal aid attorney. Typically, this cross-examination phase was for the legal aid lawyer to question and refute the evidence presented by the prosecutor. If evidence was gathered illegally or through improper inspection, the court should not admit it. Examples include evidence obtained through torture, unlawfully recorded confessions, evidence mistakenly acknowledged by the defendant, or evidence lacking a verifiable source of physical evidence during inspection.

In everyday life, evidence that the court refuses to admit also includes fragmented or leading recorded materials. The court will not accept any information obtained through illegal means. The most direct example is evidence gathered by private detectives through tracking or invading others' privacy; the court will not recognize such evidence.

And this cross-examination phase was an opportunity for the defense to rebut any errors in the evidence.

However, the legal aid attorney's expression was extremely stiff at this moment, his complexion rather unsightly. He kept his head down, seemingly oblivious to Zhou Quanmin's words.

"Defense, do you have any objections to this evidence?" Zhou Quanmin frowned and asked again.

But the defense attorney gave no reaction or reply.

"Of course we object!"

At that moment, Chen Daoguang from the defendants' bench stood up again, arguing, "This evidence is all conjecture and slander, without any solid proof!"

"They say I organized a group. Us country folks just like to hang out together. What's wrong with that? Which law says we can't hang out together?"

"We're all relatives. We often gather to chat. Is that illegal too?"

"And about the previous incident at the agritainment where the door was smashed—that happened because a bridesmaid killed my son, and they were harboring the criminal. We were desperate and wanted to get the culprit out, afraid they would let Huang Lan escape."

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