TSI amends decision on the attack upon lawyer Jorge Menezes

The Court of Second Instance (TSI) has ruled on an appeal filed by the assault victim, lawyer Jorge Menezes, amending a previous decision by the Court of First Instance (TJB) and reverting the acquittal of one of the assailants.
In July 2019, the TJB acquitted one of the two assailants, Feng Weize, who attacked the lawyer on a street in Macau and sentenced the other, Yan Yongming, to one year and nine months imprisonment.
This assault occurred in 2013 when the lawyer was attacked by the two men armed with bricks in public.
Refusing to accept this decision, Menezes appealed to the TSI.
The acquitted was then given a three-year jail sentence.
Questioned by the Times on the new ruling for the case, Menezes said, “It is the first fair assessment of the case. I accept the judges’ reasoning and agree with the judgment even regarding those issues that the court decided against me. The judgment is very well-grounded. I am also thankful that it was written in Portuguese,” he said.
“I am still utterly disappointed with the public prosecutors’ services (except for the prosecutor at the TSI) [as] they did not investigate the person who ordered the attack. They tried to clear one of the attackers, did not seek to prevent the attacker who was detained at the border from leaving Macau, did not appeal and even fought against my appeal, which is astonishing. This is utterly disappointing and should raise serious questions,” he added.
For Menezes, more important than being able to receive a fair hearing of his case at a higher court is the possibility of justice slipping away when one of the suspects was released from custody and then vanished to the mainland. Consequently, it has not been possible to bring him to the justice of the courts or through him, bring to justice the person who had ordered the attack or find out why he ordered it.
“Justice ended the day one of the attackers was set free and [had] left for China. Also, justice required the prosecutors to investigate who ordered the attack. Interestingly, they never wanted to commence this investigation,” Menezes said, adding also that he felt disappointed with the pre-trial judge and the TJB.
“I had to fight through the whole system, against the prosecutor’s and judge’s decisions to obtain a fair judgment,” he remarked.
Speaking to the Times, Menezes explained further that the law does not allow the TSI to change the penalty given to the second attacker because the prosecutor did not appeal. “Nevertheless, the TSI showed courage and integrity in punishing the [first] attacker with nearly twice the jail time handed down by the TJB [to the second assailant],” he said, noting that the TJB’s judgment was flawed because it was inconsistent.
The first assailant was acquitted by the TJB with the court considering his identification “questionable.”