Two people have been sentenced by a court in Dujiangyan, Sichuan province, for fabricating and spreading false information about giant pandas being mistreated, and severely disrupting public order.

During a first-instance trial on June 26 held by the Dujiangyan City People's Court, one defendant surnamed Bai was sentenced to a year and a half in prison and the other one surnamed Xu a year and two months, according to an announcement on the court's official WeChat account.

The court found that from March 2023 to May 2024, the two deliberately spread fake information through livestreaming and short videos, alleging that a research institution and its staff members had abused giant pandas and made profits from them, the announcement said.

They also fabricated false claims that the staff members had been arrested for violations of laws and disciplines, and incited netizens to lodge complaints, file reports, and hurl insults against the institution and its employees.

These behaviors, which aimed to boost popularity and expand influence for the defendants' social media accounts to gain economic benefits, severely disrupted the normal working order of relevant institutions as well as the work and daily lives of their workers, according to the announcement.

Police investigations revealed that by the time of their arrest, the false videos had been viewed over 545,000 times, shared 1,245 times, commented on 9,521 times, and liked 46,404 times.

The investigations by Chengdu police also discovered that Bai allegedly made nearly 200,000 yuan ($27,931) in profits from the livestreaming activities, most of which were donations from followers of his accounts.

From May to June 2024, police in Chengdu and Panzhihua in Sichuan province dismantled four criminal groups fabricating and spreading false information about giant pandas, with 12 key suspects prosecuted.

pengchao@chinadaily.com.cn