Chinese documentary filmmaker Chen Pinlin is held in pre-trial detention on accusations of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble.” Shanghai police arrested Chen, a freelance documentary filmmaker who published work under the pseudonym Plato, on November 28, 2023.
In November 2023, Chen published the documentary “Not the Foreign Force,” in which he compiled footage of the anti-COVID-restriction “White Paper Protests.” The protests were part of a movement that began in November 2022 in response to the government’s stringent lockdown measures, after a deadly apartment fire in the northwest region of Xinjiang killed at least 10 people.
On January 5, 2024, Chen was formally arrested on the same charge by Shanghai city’s Baoshan District police, and later indicted on April 3 by the Baoshan District Procuratorate, or public prosecutor.
In August, a court in Shanghai held a closed-door pre-trial meeting, which Chen’s lawyers Li Guobei and Yuan Mao said were illegal. The lawyers also accused the court of denying them access to case documents. In the indictment, prosecutors accused Chen of “knowingly spreading fabricated false information on the internet, causing serious disruption of public order; reposting and quoting remarks that insult national leaders, damaging the national image and seriously endangering national interests.”
Yuan, Chen’s lawyer, in a September 26 post on Chinese blogsite Weibo said that Chen told them the cells at the detention center were overcrowded and he had to sleep sideways and was only allowed to go outside once a month.
As of late 2024, Shanghai public security had not responded to CPJ’s request for comment sent via messaging app.
CPJ did not include Chen in its 2023 prison census because it was not aware of his arrest at the time.