Three suspects in a murder case from 12 years ago in Anhui Province were acquitted on Friday due to lack of evidence.

Bozhou Intermediate People's Court in Anhui Province announced on Friday that Dai Kemin, Li Baochun and Li Chao were innocent because the main facts of the crime are not clear and the evidence is insufficient, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

The three were charged in 2007 with murdering three and seriously injuring two members of a family 12 years ago. The court found the three guilty of intentional homicide three times in 2009, 2011 and 2013. But the higher court demanded retrial three times after the defendants appealed.

The defendants claimed that they had their confessions extracted by police through torture and showed their injuries in court.

The court made the acquittal judgment after it held an open trial on December 25 and said the charges against the three suspects did not stand up as the facts were unclear. 

"It is a sign that the judicial authority is more strictly implementing the principle of being innocent until proven guilty after the new leadership came to power," He Bing, a professor at the China University of Political Science and Law, told the Global Times.

"The principle is not new at all but has been poorly carried out in the past," He said.

The Supreme People's Court issued a document on November 21, 2013 on setting up and improving a mechanism to prevent wrong judgements in criminal cases, illegal evidence and defendant testimony obtained through torture or other illegal methods, such as forcing the accused to suffer from extreme temperatures, hunger and fatigue.

In a 2010 case, Zhao Zuohai, a villager in the central province of Henan, was found to have spent 10 years in prison for murdering a man who was actually alive.

Zhao was acquitted and released from prison after the supposedly murdered victim showed up alive. Consequently, three former police officers were arrested for allegedly torturing Zhao into confessing to a crime that never happened.

Xinhua contributed to this story