A stranger has an accident on the street: walk away or stop

Unofficial English translation of docs/遇到陌生人出事该不该停.md. In case of discrepancies the Chinese original takes precedence.

This is the long-form version of Section 13, item 2. Under the book's beneficiary yardstick, a stranger is the lowest of the four tiers: the prospect of return is small, and you don't know the person's character. So this article does not urge you to do anything; it lays out the full bill each of the three paths carries, and you choose.

This article gives no probabilities. Every layer of cost below is real and traceable to specific legal provisions, but there is no published statistic for things like "what share of rescuers have actually been hit with one of these," and the book's rule is that uncertain numbers are better left unwritten. Do not read "seven layers are listed" as "all seven will happen."

The three paths

Costs that can appear after you stop, from lighter to heavier

1. Callbacks and questioning. Calling 120 or 110 (China's police emergency number) leaves your number. You may get a callback to confirm the location, and you may be questioned once afterwards. Where a criminal-case informant is unwilling to disclose their name, the case-handling organ must keep it secret for them (刑事诉讼法第一百一十一条 — Criminal Procedure Law, Art. 111); 120 has no corresponding provision.

2. Being tracked down by the family. When surveillance footage turns up no trace of the vehicle that caused the accident, the person who left a number and was on the scene is the easiest one for the family to find. Phone pressure and showing up at your door can both happen.

3. Being named as a defendant. The side claiming you hit them bears the burden of proof itself; if it cannot produce evidence, it bears the adverse consequences (民诉法解释第九十条 — Interpretation on the Application of the Civil Procedure Law, Art. 90) — but this rule guarantees only the outcome of the judgment, not that you stay out of the case. The time limit for concluding a first-instance case under the ordinary procedure is 6 months, extendable by another 6 months in special circumstances; the simplified procedure is 3 months (民事诉讼法第一百五十二、一百六十四条 — Civil Procedure Law, Arts. 152 and 164). Even if you win outright, only three items can be shifted onto the other side: the case acceptance fee, application fees, and the travel and lost-earnings costs of witnesses, expert examiners and the like appearing in court (诉讼费用交纳办法第六、二十九条 — Measures on the Payment of Litigation Costs, Arts. 6 and 29). Attorney's fees are not among them.

4. It reaching your employer. Disturbing the order of an enterprise or public institution so that work cannot proceed normally: a warning or a fine of up to 500 yuan; where circumstances are relatively serious, detention of 5 to 10 days plus a fine of up to 1000 yuan; where it is done by a crowd, detention of 10 to 15 days for the ringleaders (治安管理处罚法第二十六条第一项 — Public Security Administration Punishments Law, Art. 26, item 1). Harassment, pestering, or stalking that interferes with normal life is punished under Art. 50, item 5, and with the approval of the head of the public security organ an order can be issued barring contact for a set period. A company firing you over this generally counts as an unlawful termination, with compensation computed at 2N (Section 19, item 6) — but reporting to the police and filing for arbitration are errands you run yourself, and the loss of the stretch when the job is already gone is not made whole later by eventually collecting 2N.

5. Being filmed and posted online. The most important thing to know at this layer: you may not be able to stop the filming. Making, using, or publicizing another person's likeness without consent is prohibited (民法典第一千零一十九条 — Civil Code, Art. 1019), but "making, using, or publicizing the likeness of the right holder where unavoidable for the purpose of news reporting" counts as reasonable use (第一千零二十条第二项 — Civil Code, Art. 1020, item 2). What you can control: no interviews, no appearing on camera, no speaking in front of the lens — whether to consent is your decision; no one can consent for you.

6. Re-sharing and cyber-harassment. Once a video spreads, the comment section is out of your control. The self-help measures available are written into 《网络暴力信息治理规定》 (Provisions on the Governance of Cyberbullying Information, effective August 1, 2024): platforms must provide protective settings such as blocking unknown or specific users, limiting the visibility of your own information, banning reposts or comments, and receiving private messages only from friends or rejecting all private messages (Art. 23); must provide a one-click evidence-preservation function for cyberbullying information (Art. 25); must set up a dedicated quick complaint-and-report entrance in a prominent position (Art. 26); and where suspected unlawful or criminal conduct is found, must promptly report to the public security organs and provide leads (Art. 15). For how to preserve evidence and report to the police, see Section 8, item 14.

7. When it gets to be too much. The six layers above can all be met with legal provisions; the seventh cannot. There is no reliable Chinese data to cite on the emotional impact of sustained online attacks, and the book gives no numbers — only an exit: the psychological-assistance hotline 12356 (China's psychological support hotline), see Section 1, item 25.

Two situations in which walking away stops being free

• You are the operator or manager of the premises, or the organizer of a mass activity (hotels, shopping malls, banks, stations, airports, stadiums, entertainment venues and the like): you bear a duty of safety protection; failing to fulfill it makes you bear tort liability, and where a third party caused the harm and you failed your duty, you bear corresponding supplementary liability (民法典第一千一百九十八条 — Civil Code, Art. 1198). For an on-duty employee or the venue operator, walking away is not the same thing as a passerby walking away.
• The matter involves you: you hit them, it is your car, or the danger was created by your own prior conduct. Then the question is no longer "whether to get involved with someone else" — it is the traffic-accident handling and hit-and-run question of Section 8, item 1.

If you decide to stop, the lowest-hassle way to do it

1. Don't move them with your hands. This is the only action with no second answer, and the reason is medical, not legal — forcing someone upright can worsen brain hemorrhage or spinal injury. On the legal side, harm caused in the course of rescue is exempted by 民法典第一百八十四条 (Civil Code, Art. 184 — voluntary emergency rescue exemption).
2. Call out from a distance and check whether they are breathing; if not, start chest compressions (Section 13, item 1); if yes, call 120 from where you are and report the location.
3. Pull in another passerby and start recording on your phone. Witness testimony and physical evidence beat arguing after the fact.
4. Don't lift them into a car on your own, and don't pay out of pocket to get them to a hospital. This is the highest-cost, lowest-return stretch of the whole road.
5. If you were injured rescuing them or spent your own money, how to get the money back is covered in Section 13, item 40.

Sources

• National People's Congress (2020). 民法典 (Civil Code) (Arts. 184, 1019, 1020, 1198). Full text republished by the Supreme People's Procuratorate. https://www.spp.gov.cn/spp/fl/202006/t20200602_463888.shtml
• Supreme People's Court (second revision 2022, effective April 10, 2022). 关于适用《中华人民共和国民事诉讼法》的解释 (Interpretation on the Application of the Civil Procedure Law of the People's Republic of China) (Art. 90). https://www.court.gov.cn/zixun/xiangqing/353651.html
• NPC Standing Committee (revised 2023, effective January 1, 2024). 民事诉讼法 (Civil Procedure Law) (Arts. 152 and 164). Full text republished by the Shanghai Municipal Development and Reform Commission. https://fgw.sh.gov.cn/ys-syjf-zc-2.4.1-h5/20240408/073febdb2b04464390546232d4089f51.html
• State Council (2006). 诉讼费用交纳办法 (Measures on the Payment of Litigation Costs) (State Council Decree No. 481, Arts. 6 and 29). https://www.gov.cn/ziliao/flfg/2006-12/29/content_483682.htm
• NPC Standing Committee (2025). 治安管理处罚法 (Public Security Administration Punishments Law) (2025 revision, effective January 1, 2026; Art. 26 item 1, Art. 50 item 5). https://www.spp.gov.cn/spp/fl/202506/t20250627_699863.shtml
• NPC Standing Committee (revised 2018). 刑事诉讼法 (Criminal Procedure Law) (Art. 111). Full text republished by the People's Procuratorate of the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. https://www.nx.jcy.gov.cn/zwsy/qwfb/202011/t20201119_608817.html
• Cyberspace Administration of China, Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of Culture and Tourism, National Radio and Television Administration (2024). 网络暴力信息治理规定 (Provisions on the Governance of Cyberbullying Information) (Arts. 15, 23, 25, 26; effective August 1, 2024). Gazette of the State Council. https://www.gov.cn/gongbao/2024/issue_11526/202408/content_6969181.html