On the 29th of May 2018, after environmental protection worker Lei Ping sued the Public Security Bureau of Xinyi city, in Guangdong province, for their decision to place her under 10-day administrative detention, it was announced that the police had withdrawn the decision, and the two parties had reached a settlement in court.
Earlier this year Lei Ping, a volunteer with the China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation (CBCGDF), was detained by the local police for “spreading rumors and disrupting public order” after she posted a report online about a local quarry polluting that was the environment. The news of her detention attracted public attention on the internet, and people including Lei Ping’s family, other volunteers and a lawyer from the CBCGDF arrived in Xinyi to help her obtain her release by the police. After 57 hours of detention during which, according to Lei Ping, the police kept asking her what her purpose was in spreading negative information on the internet about her hometown, she was finally released and the decision to detain her was suspended.
Lei Ping then filed an administrative lawsuit in the People’s Court of Maonan District of Maoming City, Guangdong Province, requesting the official revocation of the administrative penalty. During an interview with The Paper, Lei Ping commented that: “we’ve reached a good result, it’s not a matter of winning or losing this time, but the most important thing is that communication between the two sides has been strengthened.”
