By Xie Chuanjiao (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-04-26 09:20

A remote video arraignment was held for the first time by the Supreme People's Court (SPC) on Friday to review a death sentence in Fujian province.

The court held the session for Jiang Huaquan, who was being detained in the city of Quanzhou.

A local court had sentenced Jiang to death for drug trafficking.

"To try the accused and listen to their defense so as to further clarify case facts are important parts of the SPC's death penalty review," SPC spokesman Ni Shouming told China Daily.

Remote video arraignment is a new way for improving the efficiency of the reviews, Ni said.

Most of those given capital punishment are detained in various locations nationwide, and officials have said it costs a great deal of time and resources for SPC judges to be at such hearings.

"Adopting remote video technology not only ensures a face-to-face interrogation, it also helps to maximize the efficiency of the reviews," Ni said.

"Of course, if judges think it necessary, they will still conduct on-the-spot arraignments," he said.

The court also orders the recording of the remote interrogation process, which helps court officials handle such cases in line with standard judicial practice.

"It will also help to record the interrogation process for later reviews," Ni said.

The remote arraignment is carried out using the existing remote video networks of Chinese courts.

Once the SPC's system is connected to a local court's, a remote hearing can immediately be held, greatly decreasing judicial costs, officials said.

In 1981, amid rising crime, provincial courts were given the authority to hand down death sentences.

The practice, which had drawn criticism especially after reports of miscarriages of justice, ended on January 1 last year, when the SPC was given the sole power to review and ratify all death sentences to ensure that they are processed with "extreme caution".

The country's highest court has been taking steps to ensure the fair meting out of death sentences.

In July 2006, the SPC required all criminal cases that may lead to a death sentence to be heard in an open court in the second instance, ending the previous practice of documentary review that many courts have used to handle second instances of death penalty cases.

The SPC has more than 300 judges to handle criminal trials, most of them working on death penalty reviews.

Xiao Yang, the recently retired chief justice, said the first year's review had been "strictly, cautiously and fairly" meted out to a small number of serious offenders.