CHINESE LIVES MATTER: Chinese Middle-Class Anger Reignites Over Death of 29-year-old Researcher Lei Yang in Police Custody.

Criticism has been building in the days since Beijing prosecutors announced Friday that they won’t pursue negligence charges against five police officers despite finding that their “improper” actions had contributed to the death of 29-year-old Lei Yang in early May.

A number of prominent academics, lawyers and businessmen have publicly taken the prosecutors to task, saying the decision undermines the rule of law. A petition started by alumni from the university Mr. Lei attended has attracted more than a thousand signatures decrying the outcome as “inappropriate.” Some high-profile lawyers expressed willingness to represent Mr. Lei’s family in potential lawsuits against the five officers.

Though discussions of the decision were heavily censored on social media—and searches for Mr. Lei’s name blocked—two censorship-tracking websites, Weiboscope and Free Weibo, logged hundreds of deleted posts on the Weibo microblogging platform. According to WeiboScope, censorship on Weibo rose to a three-month high in the two days after the decision.

Social media and the rising expectations of China’s middle class are two tricky obstacles in the way of President Xi Jinping’s efforts to re-consolodate Communist Party power.