When Son Jun-ho, a key midfielder for South Korea’s World Cup soccer team, signed with a Chinese club, he was an indication of China’s ambition to dominate the world’s most popular sport.

曾代表韩国国家队参加世界杯的主力中前卫孙准浩签约加盟一家中国足球俱乐部时，他曾是中国希望主宰世界上最受欢迎运动的雄心象征。

But after Chinese police officers detained him two years later, accusing him of bribery and match-fixing, he became a symbol of a different sort: the ruthless efficiency of China’s legal system.

但两年后，当中国警方以收受贿赂和打假球的罪名将他拘留时，他却成了另一种象征：中国司法系统的无情效率。

Mr. Son had insisted to his interrogators that he was innocent. He asked for a lawyer, but the police told him, through a Korean translator, that one was unnecessary. The police threatened to bring his wife in and asked how his children would fare if both parents were detained.

孙准浩曾在审讯他的人面前坚持自己无罪。他要求请律师，但警方通过韩语翻译告诉他，没有必要。警方威胁要传唤他的妻子来讯问，并问如果父母都被拘留的话，他的孩子会怎么样。

After months in detention, he was offered a deal in which he was promised a lighter punishment in return for signing an admission of guilt. He took it.

在被拘留了数月后，警方向他提出一项交易，承诺只要他在认罪书上签字，警方就会对他从轻处理。他接受了。

It was a move he would later regret, saying that he had signed only under duress. “Fear overtook me, and without fully understanding the charges, I confessed, hoping to return to my family,” Mr. Son told reporters at a news conference in South Korea, fighting back tears. “It was a naïve mistake.”

他后来表示对这个交易后悔了，说自己是在胁迫下才签的字。“我吓坏了，在没有完全理解指控的情况下，就认了罪，希望能回到家人身边，”孙准浩在韩国的新闻发布会上忍着泪水对记者说。“这是个幼稚的错误。”

The arrangement Mr. Son was offered, known as plea leniency in China, is a legal tactic that scholars say has further eroded the rights of the accused in a judicial system that has long been stacked against them.

警方向孙准浩提出的交易在中国被称为认罪认罚从宽制度。学者们说，该法律政策进一步侵蚀了被告人的权益，中国的司法制度长期以来一直对被告人不利。

The courts and police in China answer to the Communist Party and the conviction rate is more than 99 percent. Still, the party has tried in recent years to create a more equitable justice system, including by introducing the “plea leniency” system.

中国的法院和警察听命于中共，对被告人的定罪率超过99%。尽管如此，中共已在近年来试图建立一个更公平的司法体系，包括确立认罪认罚从宽制度。

That system has now transformed how justice is carried out in China by enabling the authorities to process cases more quickly. But it has also made the system less fair, lawyers and experts say, by giving prosecutors more power to determine who gets punished and for how long.

该制度现已改变了中国的刑事办案，让当局能更快地处理案件。但律师和专家们说，认罪认罚从宽制度也使刑事司法变得不那么公平，因为它赋予了检察官更多权力来决定谁将受到惩罚，以及受多长时间的惩罚。

In the last few years, as Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, has waged crackdowns on corruption across society, the plea tactic has become a critical tool used by prosecutors. It has been used in investigations into officials, the military, the financial industry, and, as in Mr. Son’s case, sports, as well as in campaigns to stamp out organized crime and so-called evil forces.

在过去几年里，随着中国最高领导人习近平在全社会开展反腐败运动，认罪认罚从宽制度已成为检察官使用的一个重要工具。它被用于对官员、军队、金融行业，以及以孙准浩案为代表的体育界的调查，也被用于铲除有组织犯罪和所谓的黑恶势力的运动。

“Plea leniency is being practiced in a disturbing way,” said Pu Zhiqiang, a former human rights lawyer in Beijing who was disbarred in 2016 for “provoking trouble” for criticizing Chinese officials. “Threats used during interrogations, sleep deprivation, nobody regulates the process.”

“认罪认罚从宽制度目前正在以令人不安的方式被使用，”曾在北京当维权律师的浦志强说，他因批评中国官员在2016年被官方以“寻衅滋事”的罪名吊销了律师执照。“在审讯期间使用威胁、剥夺睡眠等手段，没有人监管这个过程。”

A Black Box

一个黑箱

Mr. Son’s detention in 2023 was part of a broader nationwide anti-corruption campaign in soccer. Many high-ranking officials have been ensnared, including the former president of the Chinese Football Association, who was sentenced to life last year for accepting bribes.

警方2023年对孙准浩进行拘留，那是全国范围内更广泛的足坛反腐运动的一部分。许多高级官员已经落网，包括去年因受贿被判处无期徒刑的中国足协前主席。

The authorities announced in September that a two-year investigation had uncovered gambling and match fixing involving 120 matches and 41 football clubs. Mr. Son was among 43 players and officials China said would be banned from the sport for life.

中国当局在去年9月宣布，一项为期两年的调查发现了涉嫌假球、赌博的比赛有120场，有41家足球俱乐部参与其中。中国表示将对43名足球球员和官员进行终身禁赛的惩罚，孙准浩是其中之一。

Many details about the investigation have not been made public, and the question of his innocence may not immediately be resolved. But Mr. Son’s account provided a glimpse into how individuals accused of crimes can be pressured into accepting plea agreements. It also gave a sense of how prosecutors use guilty pleas obtained this way to build bigger cases against other suspects — in this case, his teammate, Jin Jingdao.

当局没有公布调查的许多细节，孙准浩是否无罪的问题也许不会马上有答案。但孙准浩的讲述让人得以一瞥被指控犯罪的个人是怎样被迫接受认罪协议的，也让人们了解到检察官如何利用通过这种方式获得的认罪协议来办理针对其他嫌疑人的更大案件，在本案中，那名嫌疑人是孙准浩的队友金敬道。

Mr. Son told reporters he thought the document he had signed, which was in Chinese, was acknowledging that he had received a payment of about $28,000 from Mr. Jin. Mr. Son said that there was nothing illegal about the payment, describing it as a normal financial transaction between friends.

孙准浩对记者说，他以为他在上面签名的那份中文文件是承认他从金敬道那里收取了20万元人民币。孙准浩把那笔钱描述为朋友间的正常金钱往来，不违反任何法律。

Mr. Son had been detained in a cell in the northeastern city of Shenyang with 20 other people for nearly a year, he told reporters. “Everyday felt like hell because I didn’t know when I’d be released.” It was only after he signed that document, in March last year, he said, that he was allowed to return to South Korea.

孙准浩对记者说，他和另外20人一起被关在东北沈阳市的一间牢房里将近一年。“每天都像在地狱里一样，因为我不知道什么时候才能获释。”他说，直到去年3月在那份文件上签了名后，他才被允许返回韩国。

He later learned that Mr. Jin had confessed to match fixing and that the document Mr. Son had signed would be used as proof he had received a bribe from Mr. Jin to throw a game in 2022. Mr. Jin was later also banned for life.

他后来得知，金敬道承认了假球，孙准浩签名的文件已被作为他收受金敬道贿赂，在2022年踢假球的证据。金敬道后来也被终身禁赛。

Concerns About Coercion

对胁迫的担忧

When China introduced the plea leniency system in 2018, it was hailed as a major advancement in fairness that would allow those who admitted guilt voluntarily to be granted a “lenient” punishment.

2018年，认罪认罚从宽制度在中国的刑事政策中得到确立，当局把该制度誉为向司法公平迈出的重大一步，让那些自愿认罪的人得到了“从宽”处理。

The aim was also to streamline a judicial system grappling with a caseload that has surged over recent decades. Leniency deals can be offered to suspected offenders even before any formal charges are filed. They now account for about 90 percent of convictions.

确立该制度的目的是提高刑事司法效率，以应对近几十年来案件激增造成的积压。让检方能对犯罪嫌疑人作出宽大处理，甚至在正式提起诉讼之前。这类处理目前占定罪案件的90%左右。

But lawyers and experts say suspects are often misled into making false confessions. Even the top prosecutor’s office recently signaled a need for caution, saying plea deals should be examined for signs of coercion.

但律师和专家们表示，嫌疑人经常在被误导之下做出虚假供述。就连中国的最高检察院最近也发出信号呼吁谨慎，称应“防止出现违背意愿的认罪认罚”。

In recent interviews with Chinese media, judges raised concerns that the courts were merely rubber-stamping plea leniency deals without studying them closely. Law professors have questioned whether quotas imposed on prosecutors were creating incentives for them to strike deals hastily.

在最近接受中国媒体采访时，法官们对法院没有认真研究认罪协议的情况下，就机械地在认罪协议上盖章的做法表示担忧。法学教授们质疑，检察官面临的定罪定额是否正在激励他们匆忙达成认罪协议。

Xi Wei, a law professor at Anhui Normal University in central China, in researching this practice, found 226 cases in which defendants had pleaded guilty but authorities later discovered errors and inappropriate sentences.

安徽师范大学的法学教授奚玮在研究认罪认罚从宽系统时找到了226份案件，其中虽然被告人认了罪，但当局后来发现发现存在错误，对案件进行了再审改判。

A Powerful Tool for Shakedowns

敲诈勒索的有力工具

Defense lawyers say that plea deals are also being used to railroad entrepreneurs and go after their assets, especially as China’s economy continues to struggle.

辩护律师称，认罪协议也被用来轻率地判处企业家，谋取他们的资产，尤其是在中国经济持续低迷的情况下。

In the southwestern Chinese city of Mianyang, which has been hit by a housing downturn, the authorities in 2021 detained Zeng Jianbin, a property developer, along with his employees. Local police called them gang members and asked the public to submit evidence of crimes to prove their assertion.

在受房地产市场低迷影响的中国西南部城市绵阳，当局在2021年将房地产开发商曾建斌及其员工拘留。当地警方称他们是黑社会性质组织的成员，还为证明他们有罪呼吁公众提供证据。

The local government went after Mr. Zeng and his company’s assets, seizing acres of land, hundreds of apartments, and dozens of cars. His company had paid an $83 million deposit for a plot of land auctioned by the city. Officials took the land back and auctioned it off again.

当地政府查封了曾建斌及其公司的资产，没收了180多亩土地、数百套公寓，以及几十辆汽车。他的公司曾为购买市政府拍卖的一块土地支付了6.1亿元预付款。官员们将土地收回进行了再次拍卖。

Before the trial of Mr. Zeng and his associates started in May 2023, 14 employees — accountants, managers, staff and guards — confessed. But during the trial, those confessions started to unravel.

法院在2023年5月开始审理曾建斌及其同事的案件，14名曾任会计、经理、职工和保安的员工已在开庭前认了罪。但他们的供词在审理期间开始瓦解。

Some employees said they didn’t understand the charges and only confessed in the hope of being released, according to a trial transcript posted online. Another employee was illiterate and could not read what he had signed.

据发在网上的审理记录，一些员工说，他们没搞懂指控内容，以为只要认罪就能获释。还有一名员工是文盲，根本看不懂自己签名的文件内容。

Yet the judge accepted the plea deals and sentenced all 14 employees to prison.

但法官仍接受了他们的认罪协议，对这14名员工全部判处了有期徒刑。

Those convictions then provided the foundation for the prosecutors’ case against Mr. Zeng, who was charged with leading a gang, among other charges. He denied all the charges, accusing prosecutors of using false confessions as evidence against him.

这些定罪协议后来成了检察官起诉曾建斌的基础，检方提出的罪名包括他是领导黑帮的“黑老大”。他否认了所有指控，并指责检察官将虚假供词作为起诉他的证据。

“This confuses right and wrong, and it makes something out of nothing,” he said, according to the transcript. “These charges are not based in fact.”

“这是混淆是非，无中生有，”据庭审记录，他在法庭上这样说。“这些指控没有事实依据。”

Chen Siyu, Mr. Zeng’s wife, shared details of her husband’s ordeal on social media and with reporters. She was detained for two years for “posting false information online” and on suspicion of money laundering, and was only released in December.

曾建斌的妻子陈思宇把丈夫的遭遇发到社交媒体上，还接受记者采访。她因“在网上发布虚假信息”、涉嫌洗钱被拘留了两年，直到去年12月才被释放。

Mr. Zeng was found guilty on almost all charges, and he was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

法院认为对曾建斌的几乎所有指控都成立，他被判处20年有期徒刑。

Speaking Out

不平则鸣

Mr. Son, the South Korean soccer player, said he decided to give his side of the story after the Chinese Football Association handed him the lifetime ban in September and referred the matter to soccer’s governing body, FIFA.

韩国足球运动员孙准浩说，中国足球协会去年9月对他实施终身禁赛，并将此事提交给足球管理机构国际足联后，他决定把自己的经历公诸于世。

In January, FIFA informed South Korea’s football association that it was rejecting China’s request for a lifetime ban. A FIFA spokesman did not disclose why the organization turned down China’s request, but it is unusual for the international body to go against the ruling of a domestic association on such a serious allegation.

今年1月，国际足联通知韩国足协，它拒绝了中国足协对孙准浩全球禁赛的请求。国际足联发言人没有透露该组织拒绝中国请求的原因，但国际机构拒绝接受成员国对如此严重的指控做出的裁决是罕见的事情。

Through his agent, Mr. Son declined to be interviewed. At the news conference, he said he believed that an audio recording of his interrogation exists and that the recording would exonerate him.

孙准浩通过经纪人表示拒绝接受采访。他在去年9月的新闻发布会上说，他认为存在中国警方审讯他的录音，该录音将证明他无罪。

When asked about Mr. Son, China’s foreign ministry said the matter was closed because the player had “admitted guilt and accepted punishment.”

中国外交部在被问及该案时表示，因为“孙准浩认罪认罚”，案子已结。