Gold Belt
A Novel by Sun, Wei
The Gold Belt depicts the work and life of criminal lawyers in China. This novel is adapted into TV series by the currently top-rated Chinese TV platforms and listed companies IQiyi (over 500 million monthly active users) in China. The series has finished filming in 6 November 2024 and is set to air in the summer of 2025.
Death penalty defence is particularly important for the justice of the law. A matter of life and death, the verdict must be based on giving the suspect the opportunity for a full defence. This is also a social topic of public concern. This social topic reflects the progress of China's legal system.
Criminal defence in China has always been a mysterious and troubled area. On the one hand, China's criminal defence lawyers have a weak and ineffective position in prosecuting serious cases, and are at the mercy of the prosecutor's strong hand. On the other hand, these lawyers have been nicknamed ‘fishers’, as if they can bring suspects back to life once they step into the grey area.
Cheng Weiran is a newcomer to the law firm that caters to the rich and famous, and she is working under the firm's partner, Song Junwei. But Ching's character is so strong that she lacks the understanding to adapt to the darker rules.
Cheng Weiran is sent to deal with the case of the theft at a shopping mall by a ‘kleptomaniac’ who is the mistress of the Hengren Group’s Chairman. In order to get out of the case, the mistress gives up an important clue about a late-night traffic accident involving a sports car. The suspect in the car accident is a security guard of a clubhouse of Hengren Group.
As a result, the evidence is transformed and the traffic accident is qualified as a brutal murder case, which becomes a scandal for the Hengren Group. The Chairman of the Group blames Lawyer Song and Cheng Weiran for this and instructs them to make a death penalty defence for the suspect, on the principle that the security guard will not be sentenced to ‘death by decapitation’.
However, Cheng Weiran discovers that there are doubts and insists on defending the guard's innocence when he insists that he is guilty.
Cheng Weiran's father, who was sentenced to life imprisonment, is a self-confessed criminal. Cheng Weiran did not want to believe that her father was guilty, so she had a knot in her stomach for the defence of innocence.
The victim of the brutal run-over by a sports car was a female student at the Academy of Fine Arts, whose father was a migrant worker struggling to make a living in the city. The lawyer commissioned by the victim's father is Han Zhiyu, a classmate and ex-boyfriend of Cheng Weiran's from her university days. A self-proclaimed ‘grassroots lawyer’ who hates the rich, he is determined to kill the security guard and offers Cheng Weiran an astronomical compensation.
As the two sides play games, Cheng falls into Han Zhiyu's trap and discovers the truth about ‘buying a life to cover up a crime’. She finds evidence that points to the Chairman's son, that leads to her becoming a target for the Hengren Group to get rid of. Lawyer Song is fully committed to protecting his disciple, thus triggering a game between the law firm and Hengren Group.
In the course of gaming, evidence of the murder of the Chairman's son is found to such an extent that he could be sentenced to death, however, the real culprit is still at large. While approaching the truth, Cheng Weiran encounters the third suspect's trap again and faces imprisonment. Undeterred by the crisis of losing the case and the firm's closure, Song decides to continue the case.
In order to survive, the third suspect betrays Hengren Group and kills innocent people, leaving Hengren Group in tears. Han Zhiyu, on the other hand, abets the victim's father to get a higher compensation amount at the cost of harbouring the real culprit who killed his daughter.
Cheng Weiran fights for justice amidst the sword of lies.
Does everything have a price? Or is there still a wish that cannot be bought for a thousand dollars? When she discovers the many twists and turns of human nature in this case, Cheng Weiran begins to believe that her father's ‘self-confessed guilt’ may be something else, and decides to start her father's belated ‘not guilty’ defence.