Jingnan cell is located in Jingnan County Yamen lobby southwest of the door, in fact, the ancient grass-roots cells are basically located in the county yamen door of the southwest orientation, only a very few county yamen will be located in the cell in the southeast of the door, but also belongs to the county yamen of the “South” orientation, and therefore, the ancient prisons have the “South PrisonThe ancient prisons were commonly known as “South Prisons”.
Zhu Pingan put the sign-in book away and took Liu Mu and Liu Dazhou with him to go to the Jingnan cell.
In order to better understand the cell and the situation of the prisoners, on the way, Zhu Pingan also called on the criminal wardens Zhang Dainian.
In fact, it would be more appropriate to call on Li Da, the official in charge of public security and criminal affairs, but ……The official Li Da has asked for a leave of absence today, and did not go to work, so Zhu Pingan had to call up the criminal warder Zhang Dainian.
Jingnan County jail is a masonry structure, the cell wall is nearly five metres high, there are two layers of courtyard walls, it looks like there are years, the wall is laced with thistles, there are guard towers built, there are also two cell doors, the jailers inside the cell patrol and are heavily guarded.
“Zhang Duanmin, the prison covers an area of geometry? How many cells are inside?”Zhu Pingan asked Zhang Dainian, the official of the punishment room.
“Back to County Honour, our Jingnan County jail covers an area of about six acres and is divided into two courtyards, the inner jail and outer jail, the outer jail holds temporary and short-term prisoners, and the inner jail holds felons. For both the inner and outer prison, there are 68 cells and jailer’s rooms, of which 35 are male cells, 20 are female cells, 3 are water cells, and the rest are jailer’s rooms and torture rooms.”The punishment room warden, Zhang Dainian, returned.
Zhu Pingan nodded and stepped into the outer prison.
On hearing the news, the prison wardens and others rushed to kneel and salute, Zhu Pingan waved his hand and told them to get up.
Entering the prison, the first building was the Prison God Temple, in which was enshrined the Prison God who managed the prison, which was also the Protector God of the prison.
There were two prison gods enshrined in the Jingnan Prison God Temple, one was Gaotao at the end of primitive society, because he was appointed by Shun as an official in charge of criminal law and created prisons, so he later became the Prison God; the second was Xiao He, a prime minister in the early years of the Western Han Dynasty, because at the beginning of the time, Xiao He had been a jailer, and then later on, he helped Liu Bang to establish the legal system in the beginning of the Han Dynasty, the Nine Chapters of the Laws, so he was also honoured as a Prison God.
Every first and fifteenth day of the month, the prison would conduct worship activities at the Prison God Temple to pray for the blessing of the Prison God. When prison officers and leaders in charge took office, they would also come to worship the Prison God. Zhu Pingan followed the local customs and went in to burn incense as well.
After leaving the Prison God Temple, Zhu Pingan first went to the outer prison.
Once in the outer prison, Zhu Pingan felt like entering the food market, too many prisoners inside the cell, simply overcrowded, as if the Jingnan Prison has become the best place to live in Jingnan County. Inside the cell is not empty, each cell is stuffed with prisoners, the average cell is stuffed with no less than ten prisoners, the smallest cell inside the area is also stuffed with five prisoners.
What’s going on?
Didn’t Jingnan have mountains of cases piled up? How is it that so many prisoners are being held inside this cell?
Zhu Pingan was baffled by the numerous prisoners inside.
“My lord, unjustly accused, unjustly accused.”
“I didn’t commit a crime, let me out.”
“Please sir, let me out, I have an old man and a young man, I’m the only labourer in the family, how can the family live without me. It’s almost time for the rice harvest, how can they harvest without me?”
“Dog officer, let me out ……It’s drought and flood, the ground has no harvest, we all put”
The inmates in the prison saw someone come in, especially seeing Zhu Pingan in his official uniform, one by one, they were all furious, and they were all grabbing the fence either to cry out for injustice, plead for mercy, or simply to vent their insults.
“All be honest with me! Want to get whipped again?!”
The jailer stepped forward with his whip and threw a few lashes at the several cells that were making the most noise, shocking the crowd of prisoners into silence.
“Why are there so many people locked up in the cells? What offences have they committed?”Zhu Pingan twisted his head and asked Warden Zhang Dainian as well as the accompanying jailers.
“Back to County Honour. Most of these prisoners are there because they have not paid their taxes and are resisting the payment of taxes, about nearly a hundred of them.”
Zhang Dainian, the punishment room warden, replied back.
In ancient times, money, food and taxes accounted for a large portion of the financial revenue, so the management and punishment of this piece of taxation was relatively strict, for those who refused to pay taxes and resisted payment, the county office could indeed arrest them as a warning to others.
Zhu Pingan nodded at the words, then took two steps forward and approached the cell that had the largest number of people and had made the most noise just now.
Several wardens wanted to perform in front of Zhu Pingan, carefully guarding him as if he was an enemy.
Zhu Pingan waved his hand and only stepped forward.
“For what reason were you all imprisoned in the dungeon?”Zhu Pingan asked in a gentle manner.
“Failure to pay taxes.”The voices of the prisoners in the cell returned with varying attitudes, either cautious or resentful.
“But we didn’t mean to not pay, last year there was a drought and a flood, and then there was a sea pirate, the rice was all destroyed, we paid all the stale grain in the house, but it still wasn’t enough, I really had no choice.”
“That’s right, natural and man-made disasters have come, the fields have no grain, there’s not enough rice to eat, how can we pay the taxes?”
“Our village didn’t encounter any pirates, but because our village is on the lower reaches of the river, the flooding flooded all of our village, whether it’s the dry fields or the paddy fields, the crops in the fields were all soaked, and we didn’t receive a single grain.”
“Hmph, the word official has two mouths, and the top and bottom are all heads …..Drought and flooding is more serious, people are not much, also do not see you when the official to disaster relief, collect up taxes to a one is very positive, also do not care about the people’s life and death, can not pay the taxes on the arrest of people ……”
“Lord, I am not convinced, the village did not pay the tax is not our family, why only arrest me a person ah. I’m the only one labourer in my family, my mother is old and her legs are not convenient, my mother-in-law is weak, and my children can only run, this is about to harvest rice, if I don’t have me, what can the family do.”
……
The inmates talked back, the meaning is more or less the same, last year drought and water disasters occurred frequently, some villages also had pirates and Japanese invaders, resulting in a very serious reduction of crops, some villages even reduced to the point of no harvest, which led to their inability to pay taxes, and therefore were arrested into the prison.
In this way, Zhu Pingan listened to the explanations of the prisoners and his heart was clear. In order to understand more clearly, Zhu Pingan went from prison to prison to understand the situation, the situation is similar to the first prison, much the same.
After understanding the outer prison, Zhu Pingan went to the inner prison. The outer prison is overcrowded, and the inner prison is also overcrowded.
Apart from the fact that because of the overcrowding in the outer prison, some of the prisoners who had not paid their taxes were locked up in the inner prison, more prisoners were there because of the backlog of cases. Because of the backlog of cases, delayed trial processing, so the suspects have been in the prison has been locked up, the pile of a case, a suspect is locked up, the old prisoners were piled up, no trial processing, the new prisoners were locked up, the more the case is more and more, which led to more and more inmates in the inner prison, and finally led to overcrowding.
If the officials do not act, the people will suffer.
Zhu Pingan was deeply moved, and made up his mind.
