This chapter explores the relationship between the sharp rise in banditry, rebellion, and mixed crimes along the Qing Empire’s southern borders in the mid 1880s, and the responses of local administrators in Hong Kong and Canton to the challenges of extraditing fugitives. It traces the concurrent emergence of two contrasting discourses on justice: one framing justice as a system of legal protections against Qing law (prevalent across the Canton–Hong Kong border and increasingly within foreign concessions in treaty ports), and another asserting that foreign interference undermined the traditional justice system (notably along the Yangzi River and in missionary enclaves). This chapter argues that both discourses were strategically adopted by anti-Qing rebellions in the 1890s.