Activist Artist Goes on Trial in Beijing

The defendant, Wu Yuren, 39, is accused of assaulting a group of police officers at a Beijing police station last May. He had gone to the stationhouse with a friend who was seeking to file a complaint against his landlord, but Mr. Wu ended up in a verbal confrontation with several officers after they grabbed his cellphone, the friend, Yang Licai, said.

The police officers say Mr. Wu attacked them. Mr. Wu claims it was he who was beaten, a contention supported by Mr. Yang, who heard his cries from an adjoining room after his friend was dragged away. “The screams were terrifying,” said Mr. Yang, who was released 10 days later.

But Mr. Wu’s supporters say they believe the beating, prosecution and six months he has already spent in jail are revenge for an audacious protest he helped organize on Chang’an Avenue, the ceremonial boulevard that runs past Tiananmen Square and the heavily guarded compound housing China’s top leaders.

Mr. Wu and about two dozen other artists briefly took to the streets last February after a group of men swinging iron rods tried to evict them from the studios they occupied in an arts district that was standing in the way of a redevelopment project. The protest apparently had the desired effect: several weeks later, the landlord seeking their eviction agreed to a fairly generous compensation package in exchange for their departure.

A provocative multimedia artist whose work is slyly political, Mr. Wu may have also angered the authorities by signing Charter 08, the manifesto calling for free elections that brought its main author, Liu Xiaobo, an 11-year jail sentence — and the Nobel Peace Prize.

“I have no doubt this is a case of revenge,” said Mr. Wu’s wife, Karen Patterson, a Canadian citizen. “You have to ask why five officers decided to beat up one guy just for wanting his cellphone back. It doesn’t make sense.”

Mr. Wu could receive up to three years in prison if convicted.

At the trial on Wednesday, prosecutors showed a three-minute video that supposedly depicts Mr. Wu’s offending behavior. But his lawyer, Li Fangping, said the video, which was shot by the police and was obviously edited, only shows Mr. Wu demanding back his cellphone, then reciting the badge numbers of the officers he said were taunting him.

Mr. Li asked that the police produce an unedited version of the video, a motion that was granted by the judge.

Ms. Patterson said of the judge’s decision, “It’s a big relief to me that they’re actually considering the evidence.”

Nearly 100 supporters of Mr. Wu gathered outside the courthouse, as did a large number of police officers, some of whom were videotaping the crowd. “I was scared to come out here today, but you have to face your fears,” said Dou Bu, 38, a painter in bright red trousers whose hair was styled like that of a samurai.

“It’s not fair,” he said of his friend’s prosecution. “It’s like a game, but the rules are already set and you can’t change them.”

Benjamin Hass and Li Bibo contributed research.