From the point of view of procedural law, Du Fulei, a promising young vice president of the bank, is completely convicted of murdering his wife, because the evidence left at the crime scene can completely identify him as the murderer. So, when he was sent to Shawshank prison, he didn't cry and fear like others, and he accepted it calmly. Judging from the expression of hedley, a cellmate behind him, on the one hand, it was a confession of his wife's death, because he was unfaithful to his wife for some reasons. On the other hand, he knows that the law is ruthless. Without sufficient evidence, he can't change the cruel reality of life imprisonment. Obviously, this is fundamentally different from China's She Xianglin tragedy, because the mistake in the She case is that the procedure is illegal. Once the program is illegal, what will happen to the skin? Only by ensuring procedural justice can substantive justice be realized. Of course, the latter is not the inevitable result of the former, but this is the law. Lawmakers mainly regard it as a criterion of judgment rather than a code of conduct when formulating laws. It's like Simpson killing his wife. What a judge can do is strictly abide by the law. If the evidence is insufficient, he can only suspect a crime. Because things in the world are very complicated, he does not rule out injustice or indulgence. However, this is the law.
Du Fulei was full of hope when his new cellmate inadvertently revealed that the murderer of Du Fulei's wife was someone else. In fact, this is the result of Du Fulei's belief in the law. In his mind, the law can still bring him justice, thinking that it can make him turn over a new leaf and realize freedom. But the selfish warden Norton let Hadley shoot the key witness for his own gain, so as to control Dufresne to launder money for him forever. The warden's power brutally extinguished Dufresne's desire for freedom. How inappropriate it is to talk about rights and freedoms in the face of violent power. In fact, Dufresne had many chances to kill Norton. He could have killed him, but he didn't choose to. He clearly knew the price he would pay, but he chose to collect evidence rationally, hoping that the law would be fair. This is a dull move, but it shows the progress of mankind. Compared with barbaric society, revenge is not given to private rights but to public rights rationally, and the state is the judge.
As a place for human beings to vent, prison is full of evil and darkness. Newcomer Du Fulei is often sexually assaulted or even beaten by gay prisoners. Du Fulei was as silent as ever, but he never gave in. His hope of survival is always as bright as the searchlight on the prison high wall, and he dreams of a free life outside. This is in sharp contrast to hedley and old Bruce. Bruce was told that he could be released on parole, but he wanted to stay in prison in a way that hurt his cellmates because they had been institutionalized. Even though Bruce finally got out of prison, he tried to integrate into the society, but he couldn't adapt and finally chose to commit suicide. This is also a closed imprisonment system criticized by some criminologists, which completely isolates prisoners from society and causes great social problems. After bringing prisoners to justice to achieve special prevention, how to truly integrate prisoners into society is an extremely important but often overlooked issue. In western countries, prisoners who have been paroled often try their best to violate the parole regulations and be sent to prison because they can eat and drink here. In China, released prisoners have become an important group of secondary crimes. Moreover, the cross-infection in prison makes these people have stronger criminal ability, and the special feelings between prisoners make their interpersonal relationship more complicated. There are indications that the reality and ideal of reforming criminals are still far from each other. Therefore, how to find a reasonable balance between the realization of special prevention and the reasonable reform of criminals and their usefulness to society is a problem that we must think about.