The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 544: Confiscation and Execution
At the end of May, a heat wave quietly arrived and the capital became extremely lively.

Early in the morning, just after the hour of Mao, everything in the capital was still a little hazy in the faint morning light.

At this time, there were few people in the streets and alleys, but suddenly two long queues emerged from the Ministry of Justice.

There were probably hundreds of yamen runners and Jinyiwei.

They ran all the way, passed through the Xidan Archway and West Chang'an Street, and rushed directly into the Ministry of Revenue, arresting anyone who was the Left Vice Minister, Right Vice Minister, Doctor, and Yuanwailang.

Then, they escorted these twenty or thirty people back.

This time, the capital city was in an uproar again.

The people of the capital have been waiting for a long time.

They saw all the warehouses of the Ministry of Revenue being surrounded, and they also saw the grain being poured out of the Ministry of Revenue's granaries.

That thing, that's not food at all, it's full of sand and black bugs, and a lot of it is moldy. When the chickens and ducks saw it, they turned around and broke it up to feed the pigs, but the pigs wouldn't eat it!
Originally, the common people thought that they would soon see a drama of confiscation of property and execution.

These corrupt officials deserve to be killed for wasting food like this.

Unexpectedly, they had been waiting for more than ten days, but there was no movement.

It seems that the Ministry of Justice only arrested the Governor-General of the Granaries and more than ten warehouse ambassadors, and there was no search of property or execution.

Can the current emperor start something great but end it poorly?

This should be unlikely.

Sure enough, the show they had been waiting for for a long time was finally about to begin.

We caught twenty or thirty of them early this morning, and they were all wearing red official robes, some of them were wearing bright red robes. They were all at least of the sixth rank or above, and there were a few of them above the fourth rank.

The current emperor did not disappoint them, and the corrupt officials are doomed.

Near the Xidan Archway, all the people who saw it applauded, ran around to tell others, and were extremely excited.

Ordinary people hate corrupt officials the most, and they want to see the emperor punish them.

Some curious people even went directly to the Ministry of Justice to see how it punished corrupt officials.

This Ministry of Justice is not a county government office. It is impossible to allow a large number of people to rush in to watch the trial.

Because the Ministry of Justice tried major cases that involved too many people, it was possible that the relatives and friends of the criminals would mingle with the crowd to cause trouble or even rush into the court to rob people.

Therefore, when the Ministry of Justice is trying a case, no outsiders are allowed to enter.

Those excited people could only gather outside to listen.

What's more, they actually heard bursts of screams coming from inside from time to time.

Yuan Keli was very efficient and hardworking in trying cases.

Every time he interrogated a criminal, he would bring up a new idea of ​​injustice and then induce him to confess honestly, which would allow him to atone for his sins. If he did not confess and was discovered, his crime would be even more serious.

If you still don't confess after this inducement, you will be severely punished. If you still don't confess after being punished, you will be dragged away and the next one will be moved on.

He interrogated people from morning to night. He would have people bring lunch and dinner to the courtroom, and he would quickly eat a few bites before continuing. He would continue to interrogate people like this, and continue to interrogate them until late at night.

On that day, he actually interrogated all the twenty or thirty Ministry of Revenue officials he had captured.

He continued early the next morning. Just after the hour of Mao, he ordered people to go to the Ministry of Revenue and arrest twenty or thirty people.

Most of the people in the capital were quite excited, but some people were worried that his actions were all talk and no action.

Don't just conduct the trial, we can't see you doing it.

We can only hear a few howls outside.

You should at least show some cases of confiscation of property and execution, so that it will make you feel relieved and satisfying.

It’s not that Yuan Keli doesn’t want to confiscate the properties of corrupt officials and execute them, but the key is that he cannot make the decision on his own.

All these must be decided by the current emperor himself.

Around noon the next day, as the sun was rising, Wanli came to the imperial study with little Zhu Changxun in his arms as usual.

However, as soon as the father and son came in, they were stunned for a moment.

There was a thick stack of files on the desk!

Wanli sat down and picked up a file that looked like a large envelope. It turned out to be Yuan Keli's confession during the trial.

This guy interrogated twenty or thirty people a day!
He had interrogated all the officials including the Left Vice Minister, Right Vice Minister, Doctor, and Deputy Director of the Ministry of Revenue.

So, did anyone confess? This is the key point.

Wanli opened the file bag in his hand and took a closer look, and nodded slightly.

Yuan Keli is really good at trying cases. This guy uses three tricks right from the start: the new one is the one that breaks the law and is dirty, and he tells people what to confess to reduce his sentence, and if he doesn't confess, his sentence will be increased.

Also, don't try to get away with it. Li Dai has confessed. If you don't confess, you will be found out sooner or later.

After these three tricks were used, some officials actually confessed!

And it wasn't just one or two people, many doctors and deputy doctors confessed.

The reason these people confessed was to atone for their sins by doing meritorious service.

They are not the type who are too greedy, and their salaries are not low.

The Langzhong of the Ministry of Revenue was of the fifth rank, with a monthly salary of 16 dan, which was equivalent to 16 taels according to the grain price in the capital, or 192 taels a year, and 1,920 taels in ten years.

There was also the Deputy Director of the Ministry of Revenue, who was of the fifth rank and had a monthly salary of 14 dan, which was equivalent to 14 taels based on the grain price in the capital, or 168 taels a year, and 1,680 taels in ten years.

Most of them had embezzled more than a thousand taels of silver. They did not want to implicate their families and wanted to reduce their punishment, so they were willing to accept a beating, have their property confiscated and be exiled.

They confessed to many officials, including those from the Ministry of Revenue, local officials, and even from other government offices in the capital.

It seems that this trick of tempting corrupt officials to make meritorious deeds to atone for their sins is really good. At least it can implicate all the corrupt officials they know.

If this continues, it will be easy to purge most of the corrupt officials in the court, not all of them.

If they do this a few times, there will be fewer corrupt officials in the court. By then, even if integrity becomes the mainstream, at least the trend of corruption should be curbed.

This method is good, but there seems to be something wrong with this confession.

Wanli read the confession patiently, his brows furrowed.

Little Zhu Changxun had been reading the confession with great interest. When he saw Wanli's expression, he couldn't help but ask, "Father, what's wrong? Aren't there many corrupt officials confessing?"

Don't you see the problem?
Wanli did not answer but asked: "Do you think there is anything wrong with these corrupt officials who confessed?"

There must be something wrong with them. If there wasn't anything wrong, could the Ministry of Justice have arrested them?
What does this mean?

Little Zhu Changxun thought about it carefully, then suddenly realized, "Oh, Father, you think they lied about the amount of money they embezzled, right?"

You still don't see the problem.

Wanli shook his head slowly and said, "Whether they lied about the amount of money they embezzled or not, there is a problem.

If they lied, they most likely hid or even spent the embezzled money.

They thought we couldn't steal thousands or tens of thousands of taels, so they dared to lie.

If they weren't lying, something was even more wrong.

They were all fifth-rank officials, and their annual salary was more than one hundred taels, nearly two hundred taels.

It is extremely abnormal that an official of this level has only embezzled more than 1,000 taels after several years or even ten years of corruption.

There is a folk saying that goes, "Three years as an honest magistrate will earn you 100,000 silver coins."

Officials of their level in the court would be considered prefects if they were placed in the local government.

An official of this rank could easily embezzle more than a thousand taels."

Oh, it turns out that it is abnormal for an official of this level to only embezzle more than a thousand taels.

Upon hearing this, Xiao Zhu Changxun slowly nodded and said, "I understand, Father. How are you going to deal with these corrupt officials?"

How to deal with it?

Wanli flipped through the confession again, then said solemnly: "Our goal is to cleanse the court of corrupt officials as much as possible.

In order to achieve this goal, these officials whose corruption is not too serious must implicate as many real corrupt officials as possible.

We will treat those who confessed this time as bounties. Regardless of whether they have committed any crime or not, it will be considered as their meritorious service and forgiveness of their sins. We will just give them a beating, confiscate their property and exile them.

As for those who refused to confess even after being tortured, they could not be let off easily. Many of the officials who confessed mentioned the same officials.

They mentioned it at the same time, and Li Dai also mentioned it. The officials mentioned must have been corrupt. We don't need to investigate them. We can just confiscate their property, execute them, and exile their entire family!"

After saying that, he picked up the pen and began to mark.

The drama of confiscation of property and execution that the people of the capital have been looking forward to is finally about to take place.

(End of this chapter)