After five months of trial, there is still no sentence: The Yuan Yuan case turned the "illegal operation" into an endless detention

A biblical player with recorded sermons is keeping Zhejiang’s Wenzhou pastor, Huang Yue, in custody for more than a year.China Aid Association Declaration on September 17The Pyeongyang County Court again extended the trial deadline for the case, and the new deadline was pushed to November

1. The case had already opened in April, and the four Christians who were taken during the same period had also been released or other restrictions lifted, but the only person who remained in custody.

The case has been opened, waiting for the verdict but continues to become a detention period

He was taken away by the police on June 26, 2025, in a case involving the issuance of a Bible player with his preaching recordings to members of the church, and the police investigated him on suspicion of “unlawful business crimes.” On April 20, 2026, the court held a pre-trial session and held a formal trial from April 24 to

1. On August 21, the Pyeongyang County Court notified his wife, Lin Ali, that the time limit for the case was extended again to November 24, without any explanation for the extension.

The extension of time limit is not naturally illegal in criminal proceedings in China, and complex cases can be extended according to law when the conditions are met. But when the defendant has been detained for more than a year, the trial has ended, and the verdict has been postponed once again, the procedure itself begins to have substantial consequences: a person who has not been finally convicted by the court continues to lose his freedom in the form of pre-trial and pending detention.

The longer the detention lasts, the weaker the defendant’s connection to family, church and social life, and the greater the health and psychological stress; and even if the prosecutor can not finally prove all the charges, the loss of freedom that has already occurred can not really be reimbursed.

“Illegal business” bypasses religious crimes, but still acts on religious activities”

The core object of the case is not complicated: the Bible player and the recording of the preaching in it. The Chinese Aid Association cited defense observers as saying that the persons involved did not carry out commercial profits through the player. Whether it ultimately constituted an illegal business crime should be judged by the court based on evidence and law, but the case showed a common path in recent years – religious activity itself is not directly a crime, and ordinary criminal or economic legal clauses such as publishing, operating, networking, funding can become the entrance to prosecution.

This change will change the legal risks faced by religious groups.Publishing, printing religious materials, online preaching, receiving devotions, and producing players are different ways in which religious communities maintain their activities; once these behaviors enter criminal frameworks such as publication, networking, business or fraud, religious organizations may still face criminal risks in their daily operations, even if they avoid public political expression.

The history between Zhejiang Crucifixion and Zhejiang Crucifixion has not disappeared

He was not the first to enter the criminal justice system. During the mass demolition of the church cross in Zhejiang in 2014, he was concerned for public opposition to related actions. After being arrested in August 2014, the Pyeongyang County Court sentenced him to one year in prison for mass disturbance of social order in 2015.

More than a decade later, the accusation has changed from “mass disturbance of social order” to “state secret” to “illegal operation”, but the subject matter of the case is still the same pastor who has been involved in independent religious activities for a long time. This continuity makes it difficult to see the case as just one ordinary player business dispute. A person’s past religious activities, conflicts with the local religious administration department, and today’s criminal cases, constitute an indissoluble background in reality.

The Zhejiang Crusade Movement has pushed Wenzhou into the center of Chinese religious governance controversy.Public information showsAfter 2014, a large number of local church buildings or crosses were demolished, including both family churches and churches that joined the official tripartite system.

Examination limits are constantly pushing backwards, the court bears not only procedural responsibility

The duty of the criminal court is not only to write the final two words "innocent" or "innocent", but also to ensure that the state has a continuous, sufficient and reviewable reason to restrict a person's freedom before a verdict. The simpler the case, the longer the trial ends, the more prominent this responsibility.

The case has now formed a clear contradiction: the items and main acts involved in the case are not secret, the case has been publicly undergoing a court session and formal trial, and other persons in the case have also been released from detention, but the only persistent detainees are still waiting for a continuously delayed judgment. If the court considers evidence sufficient to convict, it should be judged in accordance with the law and allow the defendant to enter the appeal procedure; if evidence is insufficient, continuous detention is more necessary to undergo strict review.

When the procedure itself becomes a punishment, the time before the verdict is no longer neutral.

Long-term detention in China has long been a problem with high detention rates and insufficient use of pre-trial detention alternatives.In religious, human rights and national security cases, long-term detention also has an additional effect: it cuts the organizers’ ties to the community and lets other members see the costs of continuing activities.

How the final verdict in the Yuan Yuan case will still depend on the court. But from June 2025, it was taken away, until the trial in April 2026, and until the time limit was pushed to November, the time itself has become part of the case. If a judicial procedure is continuously extended but can not give a judge in time, then "waiting for a verdict" could turn from a procedures that guarantee prudent judgment, to a deprivation of freedom of continuous enforcement without a final judgment.