Reflect Upon "Xu Ting Case"

What we said"law"is not a dogma printed in the books but a situation when the law applicable to the ordinary life. A justice of the U.S Supreme Court has said:"We are under the Constitution, but the Constitution is what the judges say it is."So when we try to know what the real law is, we should pay more attention to the cases have happened around us but not only staring at the books or articles.A principle is undoubtedly true: We could never ask the citizens and judicial practices to fit our theories. On the contrary, our theories ought to adapt the development of the whole society, the needs of the citizens. Meanwhile, one more thing we should understand clearly: Throughout the whole process of founding country under the rule of law, the citizens are protagonists but absolutely not bystanders. For these reasons, as a legal person, we should try our best to know exactly and comprehensively what the citizens thinking about. Of course, we could not communicate with a plain citizen with a series of incomprehensible theories. But every ordinary case is a best media to communicate both of us.For the reasons above, I'd like to take an adventure to select a typical and controversial criminal case—"Xu Ting case"—a case which has been trialed four times by 2 Trial-levels courts and finally his commutation was approved by the P.R.C Supreme Court, from life incarceration to 5 years incarceration.This paper is divided into two main parts: One is normative study and the other is ultra-normative research. The part of normative study includes two chapters: Guilty or not Guilty? (The First Chapter) and Sentencing Questions (The second Chapter).The part of ultra-normative research includes three chapters: Influence of the Public Media and Internet (The Third Chapter), Highlights the Supreme Court (The Fourth Chapter), Reflection upon Our Legal Person(The Last Chapter).