A Shaanxi farmer's conviction for fraud for faking a photo of an endangered South China tiger has failed to silence critics, who believe he was merely a scapegoat in the saga.
Various websites have carried postings with queries, with some suggesting that even though farmer Zhou Zhenglong might be involved in the scandal, it was highly likely other accomplices - such as local officials who wanted to take advantage of the apparent discovery of the rare species - were involved.
Last Saturday, a court sentenced the 54-year-old farmer to 21/2 years in prison and fined him 2,000 yuan (HK$2,251). Zhou said he fabricated the tiger photos by himself and no one else was involved. The trial lasted about five hours.
He also said he took the photos in October last year. When the shot was published the case caught nationwide attention, as the tiger was thought to be nearly extinct. He was later awarded 20,000 yuan by the provincial forestry department.
Zhou's wife, Luo Dacui, insisted yesterday that her husband was innocent and pledged to lodge an appeal.
'However, the court hasn't given me the judgment yet, so we can't lodge an appeal as we need the document to do so,' Ms Luo said, expressing worries that they might not be able to file the appeal in time as there were only five days to go before the appeal period ended.
She complained that Zhang Yong, Zhou's lawyer, had not tried his best in his defence, and also questioned his decision not to lodge an appeal on Zhou's behalf. Mr Zhang had cited the public's doubts over his impartiality for why he would not appeal.
Activist lawyer Hao Jingsong, who brought a claim against Zhou exposing the scam, insisted that he believed the farmer was a scapegoat, as he would not have been able to cause such a huge scandal without at least the tacit help of local authorities.
'I believe the local officials have done something to ask him to shoulder all the blame, which is why he just admitted doing it alone in the trial,' said Mr Hao yesterday.
Netizens, who played a key role in exposing the photos as fake, have long suggested local officials were probably involved, as developing tourism in the area where the tiger was first allegedly spotted would certainly generate much income for the local government.
Fu Dezhi - a leading botanist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, who was one of the first to insist the photos were fake - wrote recently in his blog that evidence had shown that the real culprit should be a local official, not Zhou.
Stressing he was willing to testify in court over his allegations, Mr Fu cited evidence including the fact that Zhou did not know where a leaf, which was shown hanging over the tiger's head in the photo but later found to be fake, came from.
Another piece of evidence was that Zhou had claimed he had stayed in the forest to take photos of the tiger the whole day and only returned home at about 9pm or 10pm, but at least two groups of people had been quoted in a China Central Television investigative report saying that Zhou was seen in the village at about 5pm.