Lawyers try to bail reporter in illegal detention case

The application for obtaining a guarantor pending trial was submitted on Monday to local police in Shandong Province for the journalist with the Beijing-based Caixin Media, who was detained on charges of illegal imprisonment.

Chen Baocheng, the reporter, was in detention with seven villagers in Pingdu, after they allegedly detained an excavator operator for over 25 hours.

They claimed the operator was illegally digging up the grounds of an earlier illegally demolished house on Friday.

The incident in Chen's ancestral village saw a lawyer team organized Monday and lawyers will meet those villagers who were trying to protect their land, read a Sina Weibo post by Chen's wife.

Public debate has been stirred as some claimed Chen had been safeguarding the villagers' rights, while local police told the Jinan-based news portal dzwww.com that what Chen did threatened the operator's life and police went there for a rescue mission.

"The homestead should be protected by the law as personal property and any activity on the plot forbidden without the owner's approval or demolition permission," Li said, adding that it is every citizen's obligation to seize anyone suspected of illegal demolition, and it is legal to hold them at the scene before the police come.

However, Chen is said to have turned violent as he allegedly poured gasoline on the demolition worker and wielded a knife when the police were there for his rescue, Ji Xuguang, an investigative journalist, said on his Sina Weibo Monday.

Li Huiqing, the journalist's lawyer, told the Global Times it remains unknown if the eight people were acting aggressively.

There was no police rescue and several unidentified people who claimed to be the operator's family were trying to take the operator away, the lawyer said, adding that Chen did have a knife but did not wield it.

The operator was actually willing to stay as he would still get paid for the job. His family were also allowed to deliver food to him on Friday evening.

"Previously, local police refused to show up after they were called to stop the demolition, while this time they did arrive but were watching," Chen's wife told the Global Times.

Local police could not be reached as of late Monday.