Chapter 1305 Severe punishment without mercy

Chapter 1305 Severe punishment without mercy

In addition to Yu Wenzhi and Yu Lan, there were several other dudes who participated in the kidnapping of Gao Min. Although they were not as prominent as these two, they were not ordinary children.

These people are all going home now. Some of them have not yet realized the seriousness of the problem. Even if some people are aware of it, they still think that the problem is not big. After all, there are Yuwen Zhi and Yu Lan who are standing in front of them. Even if the court wants to investigate, the punishment that falls on them will not be too severe.

After all, they each had meritorious deeds, so what kind of crime would it be to kidnap a traitor and teach him a lesson on his own territory in Chang'an City? As for the political turmoil and consequences that Yu Wenzhi's plan to obtain his father's title would cause, they were not aware of it and thought it was just a family dispute.

So when Yu Wenxian led the soldiers of the Forbidden Army to arrest these people, their first reaction was disbelief, and then they became furious. It's just that your Yuwen family is at odds with each other and is trying to rob the heir. We are just helping out out of loyalty, but we are actually being avenged by the public!

But in any case, it only took one morning for all the people involved in the matter to be detained in Yushitai, including the sufferer Gao Mi who had been sent to Jingzhao Mansion. People from both parties were controlled. stand up.

Liu Qing, who had just gone to Jingzhao Mansion to perform his duties, returned to the imperial city again and interrogated all the people involved together with Yushi Zhongcheng Liu Fan. Since the case was not complicated in the first place, and the people involved were not aware of the imperial court's Therefore, they honestly explained the underlying reasons for the big war and their respective thoughts, and soon a relevant dossier was formed.

The interrogation of this case is not the focus. The human interactions outside the case are the real highlights. Apart from Gao Xiaowan who immediately made a decision and complained about injustice, and Yu Wenyong who exterminated his relatives for justice, among other relevant persons, Yu Jin's son Yu Shi was also charged with leaving his post without permission and spying, and was approved by Prime Minister Xiao Jin. Yushitai.

The relatives of other people involved originally rushed to the Yongguo Palace and wanted to ask Tai Tu how to remedy the situation. However, before they could say a few words, they saw the Imperial Army coming and arresting them again. Having a son named Yu Jin, they couldn't help but take a deep breath and realize the seriousness of the situation.

At this time, Yu Jin also realized that the trouble was not small, so he immediately prepared the car and went to the imperial city in person to prepare to enter the supreme palace.

However, his chariot had just arrived outside the imperial city. There were already eunuchs waiting here. They came to Yu Jin's chariot and said respectfully: "Your Majesty knows that the two breaths of the Taifu's house are tied to Lantai. The Taifu must be feeling uneasy." , I am about to enter the palace to see you, and I have specially ordered my subordinates to wait here. Your Majesty ordered me to tell the Grand Tutor that the matter is not an unforgivable crime and will be dealt with impartially. If the Grand Tutor returns home and waits at ease at this time, it is enough. , no matter how serious the sentence is, I am afraid that the matter will harm the Taifu. The Supreme Lord specially ordered twenty people to guard the Taifu's residence and stay in peace."

After Yu Jin heard this, his face darkened again, so he stopped getting out of the car and silently waved to his slaves to drive out of the imperial city and go to his home. As for the twenty personal guards entrusted by the imperial court, they were all well-armed and followed behind the vehicle.

Even Yu Jin was rejected outside the imperial city. Even if the other relatives and elders worked hard to inquire, the useful information they could obtain and the effect they exerted were very limited.

In the evening, Liu Fan and Liu Qing submitted the files compiled into volumes after the interrogation to the palace for the supreme review.

The sequence of events in this series of events is also very simple. Gao Mi went to the Duke of Qi's Mansion to visit him. When he left, he was intercepted and kidnapped by Yu Wenzhi and others. After that, Gao Xiaowan sued the Jingzhao Mansion and knew that Yu Jin's son was involved. , suspected that the powerful people in the DPRK wanted to retaliate against his family, so he knelt in front of the Suzaku Gate and cried out for injustice, which then triggered a series of subsequent events.

As for the matter of Yu Wenzhi and others re-discussing the public heir order of Qi State due to the special relationship between Gao Mi and the wife of Qi State, since it has not yet been implemented in action, a separate case needs to be opened for slander and discussion of government affairs.

Putting aside all factors, what Yu Wenzhi and others committed was a public security crime. On the contrary, Gao Xiaowan's crimes were more serious, namely disturbing the court ceremony and falsely accusing the minister.

When everyone's sins are sorted out, the next step is to punish everyone involved. For related crimes, the imperial court also had laws and regulations to punish them. The laws and regulations that had been compiled as early as the Tongzhi period of the Western Wei Dynasty had already been written down, and were officially promulgated as the "Kaihuang Code" in the first year of the founding of the Tang Dynasty.

According to the regulations of the "Kaihuang Code", the punishment for committing crimes in Kinai City also varies depending on the size of the crime. For serious crimes, beheading or hanging, while for lighter crimes, there are whipping, cane and other punishments.

Because Yu Wenzhi and others did not hurt anyone to death, they naturally did not need the highest punishment. However, because they kidnapped people with official titles, they could be on the verge of imprisonment or exile.

However, the "Kaihuang Code" also has preferential treatment regulations for officials who commit crimes, namely negotiation, reduction, redemption, and punishment.

The meeting is divided into eight groups, and the eight groups are the eight statuses of relatives, friends, virtuous people, nobles, and diligent guests. People with these eight statuses need to follow special judicial procedures, and the punishments must be reduced or reduced as appropriate. The reduction is that those who commit crimes against officials of the seventh rank or higher will be reduced by one rank compared to ordinary people. Redemption is the payment of a fine to reduce guilt. When officials commit crimes, they can use their official status to offset their prison sentences and exiles.

If the verdict is made according to the provisions of the law, most of these dandies will pay a fine and then suffer some flogging, and the matter will be over. This is obviously unacceptable to Li Tai, and such punishment will not have any warning effect at all.

This time, Yuwen Zhi and others kidnapped Gao Xi in the street, and Gao Yanzong attacked and killed Cui Jishu in the street before, all of which reflected that the security situation in the capital was worrying. The deeper reason was that the world had been in chaos for a long time, and these officials and dignitaries used the power they controlled willfully, and the court could not effectively control and prevent it at the level of law and order supervision, so they were fearless.

In the eyes of many people, their official titles themselves have the privilege of doing whatever they want, and the meritorious official titles are for being free from constraints. Perhaps they need to abide by the responsibility of loyalty and service to their superiors, but they are still free from taboos to their subordinates, and they don’t have to abide by any rules and regulations.

The world has been in turmoil for many years. Both the court's laws and regulations and the social moral norms have suffered great damage. It is not easy to re-establish norms.

In particular, there are many powerful people in Chang'an City. They serve the country with loyalty, but they have to share the city resources with the common people and abide by the city rules. If they do not have a certain moral quality, it is really difficult to abide by them.

Therefore, until the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the customs of the people in the capital were still the worst in Guanzhong, because it was full of privileged classes and speculators, as well as various strong bandits and robbers, which can be said to be full of five evils.

Li Tai naturally did not want such problems to continue to exist in Chang'an City under his rule. He strictly dealt with this matter in order to set an example. After listening to the case report of Liu Qing and others, he said: "This group of people will be sentenced first for slandering the government. After the judgment, the group of people shall not be released and will be transferred to Jingzhao Prefecture Prison for imprisonment."

The current laws and regulations are not enough to severely punish these people and warn the current trend, so Li Tai plans to punish them for another crime with more flexible sentencing. At the same time, he urged the officials to speed up the compilation of new relevant regulations. Although the later criminal laws and regulations cannot severely punish the previous crimes, the combination of multiple crimes can also give people a sufficient warning effect.

Slandering the government can disturb the eyes and ears at the lightest and harbor evil intentions at the worst. The sentencing depends entirely on the thoughts of the king and the people in power. Especially now that the court is rewarding meritorious people with official titles, these dandies are so bold that they think the court is unfair in granting titles. If they are not severely punished, it will naturally not be enough to set things right.

So when the officials make a judgment based on this, the sentencing will be much more severe.

All the people involved in the incident who have been granted official titles will be removed, and they will be sentenced to imprisonment and not allowed to participate in the selection of officials, which directly puts an end to their political future in advance. Among them, Yuwen Zhi and Yu Lan are the main culprits and are sentenced to exile. As for Taifu Yu Jin, he was stripped of his title of Taifu because of his poor education, and was returned to his residence with the ceremony of the Three Dukes for his old merits, and no longer participated in the government.

As for the other people who were involved in the same case but not guilty of the same crime, the Minister of Rites Yu Shi was dismissed from the court and sent to be the governor of Changsha, Xiangzhou. The Shangcheng Fengyu Gao Xiaowan was stripped of his title, and his father's title of county earl was returned to his brother Gao Xiaoyu. Gao Xiaowan was demoted to the deputy supervisor of Shayuan and left Beijing to go to Shayuan to take charge of the livestock affairs of Shayuan Stable.

The announcement of the punishment naturally made the court and the public feel awe-inspiring. No one in the capital would have thought that just a group of dandies playing around would cause such a big disturbance. Not only was the Jingzhao Yin in charge dismissed, but even a senior and respected elder of the country like the Taifu Yu Jin was also deeply implicated. As for the severe punishment suffered by those involved, it was even more regrettable, and their families were also very upset.

In this situation of boiling public sentiment, the court issued the "Clean Street Style for the City and Squares in the Capital" and distributed it to Jingzhao Prefecture and the county offices of the two counties in the capital, ordering that the style would be used to manage the public security of the city and squares in the capital in the autumn.