A Chinese blogger who helped victims of a devastating earthquake has been sentenced to three years in prison, his attorney said Monday.

According to his lawyer, Mo Shaoping, Huang Qi received the maximum sentence for “illegally holding secret state documents.”

Saying his activities support China’s efforts to institute the rule of law, the US State Department had protested the blogger’s jailing.

State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid said that Huang was detained in June 2008 after working to help families of children killed in the May 12, 2008, Sichuan earthquake because of the collapse of poorly constructed school buildings.

According to the organization Reporters Without Borders, Huang, founder of the human rights Web site 64Tianwang, had been posting articles on the site criticizing the way the earthquake relief was being organized.

He wrote on May 20, 2008, “The reports we are seeing [from the Chinese government] are biased.”

(article source: CNN, image source: Wellesley College)