Justice System: I Litigate for the Whole City

Chapter 156 : The Crossed-Out Box

When the screen lit up, no one in the Third Courtroom spoke.

The court clerk moved the cursor to a new line in the transcript. The presiding judge nudged up the pair of glasses with white thread wrapped around the left temple, laid both hands flat on the case file, and waited. Someone in the second row of the gallery shifted in their seat; a chair leg scraped against the floor, then silence. In the first row, Huang Weizhong's coat still hung over his arm. He fished a pen out of his overcoat pocket and set it on the paper on his knee without writing anything.

Lin Qi's finger hovered over the screen for a moment, then she tapped the pinned group chat. The group's name was two characters: Obstetrics.

"Your Honor, the plaintiff will follow the order just agreed upon." Shen Zhixia stood behind the plaintiff's bench without stepping forward. "Let the witness operate the phone herself. Please have the clerk record the time of every step."

"Noted," the judge said.

"10:51 — witness unlocks the phone and opens the group chat."

"10:52 — witness searches the group for messages from December 27th."

"10:54 — witness opens an image and enlarges it."

Those three lines and the hum of the air conditioning were the only sounds in the courtroom. Lin Qi propped the phone against the witness stand's surface, screen angled toward the judge's side. She had enlarged a shift schedule: the header read Obstetrics Physician Shift Schedule (December), with three rows across — Day Shift, Evening Shift, Night Shift — and thirty-one columns, names filling the boxes in tiny print.

"Your Honor, the plaintiff asks the witness to read the December 30th box aloud."

"The 30th," Lin Qi said. "Night shift."

She paused, fingertip resting on that box.

"In this box, the name has a line through it. Crossed out is my name. Written in beside it is someone else's name."

"Who posted this image?"

"The head nurse, Yan Mei."

"Where did the dates in this image come from?"

"They're on it." Lin Qi pushed the screen up slightly. "Yan Mei sent it in the group at 10:04 a.m. on December 27th."

[Thud. The pen could cross out the name on the page, but it could not cross out that night.]

At the plaintiff's bench, Peng Weidong lifted his head once. His hand stayed pressed against the edge of the chair, rose with his head, then dropped back down. In the back row of the gallery, Ma Jianjun hadn't moved; his helmet sat by his feet, his eyes tracking the phone on the witness stand.

"Are you still in this group?" Shen Zhixia asked.

"I was removed at the end of January." Lin Qi said. "The messages are still there. The image is still there. What this group looks like today — I can't touch it."

"Who removed you?"

"I don't know. An admin removed me."

"Please also read the night shift for the 26th."

"Night shift on the 26th — me." Lin Qi said. "That night, at 3:40 a.m., she passed."

"And the night shift on the 30th?"

"That's not me." She said. "Someone else covered the shift. The person on duty that night was not me."

"When did the crossing-out in this box appear?"

"It was there when the image was first posted." Lin Qi said. "The department made the schedule, and the department crossed it out. This is how it came to me."

Shen Zhixia closed her hard-shell folder, tucked it under her arm, and turned to face the defendant's bench directly.

"Your Honor, the plaintiff asks the court to note the following." She said. "The materials the defendant submitted to the District Health Commission within three business days state that night shift handover 'was carried out in accordance with the department shift schedule, with no anomalies' — yet the defendant did not attach the shift schedule. The image in court today came from the defendant's own department group chat. The plaintiff asks the defendant to answer one question in open court: was the person on duty the night of December 30th the person whose name is crossed out in this image?"

No one at the defendant's bench responded right away. Director Xu tilted his head half an inch toward Lu Jibai. Lu Jibai stood, hands braced on the edge of the table.

"The defendant needs to verify with the hospital." He said. "We will respond together in our cross-examination opinion."

"The defendant will respond today," the judge said, tapping his pen once against the case file.

Only after the clerk finished recording these exchanges did the sound of turning paper return to the courtroom.

At the defendant's bench, Director Xu's hand came up and knocked once on the table edge. He stood.

"Your Honor, the defendant has a few words. This image — can't it be produced?" He said. "The phone is her own. She was removed from the group at the end of January — who knows whether the image is still in its original state? Images can be edited, groups can be left, records can be cleared. She's the plaintiff's witness, the phone's in her hand, and whatever she scrolls to is what the court sees?"

The judge set down his pen.

"The defendant's opinions will be presented by the defendant's agent." He said. "Defendant's counsel — do you have any objections to this set of the plaintiff's evidence?"

Director Xu remained standing without sitting, glancing sideways once. Lu Jibai rose.

"The defendant objects to the evidential weight of this exhibit." He said. "This image shows how the department scheduled shifts. It does not show what anyone did on the night of December 30th. If the plaintiff wants to use it to leap from 'scheduling' to 'fault in medical conduct,' the plaintiff has to make that leap herself. The defendant asks the court to note this in the cross-examination record."

"Does the defendant have any other objections?"

"The defendant does not allege this image was altered." Lu Jibai said. "The defendant only asks the court to note those three points."

Only then did Director Xu sit down. The chair leg knocked once.

Shen Zhixia waited for the sound to fade. She wrote two lines on her hard-shell folder, and only after writing did she realize she'd copied down his words from just now — his words, because he hadn't spent a single sentence trying to tear that phone apart on the hospital's behalf.

"Your Honor, the plaintiff responds with three points." She said. "First, this phone has not left the courtroom from the moment it was unlocked until now; the clerk has recorded the time of every step on the screen. The sender and the time of sending are both on this image. The witness was removed from this group at the end of January. From that day forward, she could not change a single word in the group — and the box in that image is still crossed out. Second, the person who posted it is still in this group, and the date of posting is on this image. If the defendant says the image was fabricated, all it needs to do is call in the person who sent it to explain one sentence. To this day, the defendant has not done so."

"Third, on February 2nd, in the medical records room, the plaintiff's agent heard two statements: on the morning of January 5th, someone from the Medical Affairs Office came to the records room to borrow a hole punch; on the afternoon of January 7th, when the stack of paper was returned, the signatures were complete. These two statements are written in the plaintiff's on-site record, which has already been read aloud."

She flipped the hard-shell folder to that page and asked the clerk to pass it to the witness for identification.

"In the image, the name crossed out in the 30th box is this witness's name." She said. "Yet on those pages of the defendant's, the 'Lin Qi' written stroke by stroke — whose handwriting is it? The defendant still hasn't answered. The image won't claim her. The paper does. What the plaintiff asks the court to see this morning is precisely this contradiction."

The judge took the page, flipped through it, and wrote a note.

"One more thing." Shen Zhixia said. "The materials the defendant submitted to the district did not include the shift schedule. The plaintiff requests that the defendant submit the duty log and shift handover record for the night of December 30th."

"The defendant will submit within three days," the judge said.

"The defendant will retrieve them," Lu Jibai said.

"Plaintiff, continue."

"The plaintiff applies for handwriting identification in open court." Shen Zhixia said. "The plaintiff requests identification of two 'Lin Qi' signatures: first, the signature on the final page of the transcended copy of the nursing records; second, the signature on the Self-Review Statement the defendant submitted to the District Health Commission. There are two comparison samples, both in court today — one is the signature this witness just wrote by her own hand on the Witness Pledge this morning, and the other is the name sample she wrote in her own hand on January 31st."

[Thud. One hand cannot write two different hands.]

The defendant's bench went silent for half a second. Lu Jibai stood.

"The defendant does not object to the appraisal process." He said. "But the plaintiff should first connect these two signatures to the medical damage dispute at issue in this case. Whose hand wrote the two characters and how the patient died are legally not the same matter."

"They are connected." Shen Zhixia said. "The defendant's January 27th Disposition Decision states that the alterations to the medical records were the act of this witness alone. On the reply the defendant submitted to the district on February 13th, the 'Writer' field was left empty, while the 'Handler' field lists the name of Director Xu of the Medical Affairs Office. The defendant pinned the blame on her — but never produced the person whose signature is on the page. Whether she wrote it was a question the defendant raised first."

"Entered into the record." The judge said. "The plaintiff's handwriting identification application — submit a written application and sample list within three days. The defendant may file any objections in writing."

Director Xu's hand came up again. This time he didn't knock on the table edge; he stood directly.

"Your Honor, the defendant applies to submit a new piece of evidence in open court."

The courtroom stilled. All morning, whenever anything on paper had come up, it was Lu Jibai who stood. This time the person standing was Director Xu, briefcase already open, one hand pressed against its mouth.

The judge looked at him.

"The defendant is required to state three things: the name of the evidence, its source or form, and the reason for late submission."

"This morning, our hospital found a page in the department." Director Xu said. "It is an explanatory statement written in Lin Qi's own hand."

"Source."

"Found within the hospital and handed to me."

"Reason for late submission."

"It only reached my hands this morning."

"Who handed it over?"

"Someone inside the hospital."

"Form."

"One page. Original."

"Is there a copy?"

"Yes. Two photocopies."

The three answers came smoothly, like something rehearsed. Shen Zhixia listened while pressing the hard-shell folder flat under her own fingers. Beside the plaintiff's bench, He Xiufen twisted the lid of her thermos half a turn, very slowly.

"The defendant will submit a separate written statement within three days." The judge said. "State clearly where this page came from, when it was found, and who handed it over. The court will admit the original first; copies will go to the plaintiff."

Director Xu drew a kraft paper envelope from his briefcase. The flap was wound shut twice with string, the string secured by a small strip of clear tape, its edge curling up. He raised the envelope and handed it toward the judges' bench.

At the witness stand, Lin Qi switched off the phone screen and laid it face down on the surface. She did not look at the envelope. Her eyes settled on the hand she'd pressed down over it.

Shen Zhixia watched the other side. Lu Jibai stood behind the defendant's bench, not reaching out. His fingers were pressed against the corner of his folder, pressed hard. He didn't look at the envelope being handed up. He looked at Director Xu first — for two seconds — and only then turned back to the judges' bench and began, half a sentence:

"Your Honor, with regard to this evidence, the defendant..."

"Defendant's counsel, sit down first." The judge said. "The court will admit the material first, then hear opinions. Bailiff, take the document."