(Clearwisdom.net) Since 2003, over ninety Falun Dafa practitioners have been detained at Deyang Prison, Sichuan Province, where they have endured various physical and mental torture.
The No. 2 Brigade in Deyang Prison is the place where police collectively tortured practitioners. In order to force practitioners to declare that they were criminals, police exhausted every means of persecution. For instance, they deprived practitioners of sleep for several days and nights by forcing them to stand. They beat them with electric batons and forced them to perform drills in the burning sun. They handcuffed and shackled the practitioners, and put them into solitary confinement. Practitioners Ms. Zun Yuxian and Mr. Cao Jiguang were detained in strictly monitored cells for long periods of time because they refused to write "confessions" detailing how Falun Gong practitioners had allegedly committed various crimes, and they refused to wear prison uniforms or recite the prison rules.
When Mr. Cao Jiguang was first sent to the No. 2 Brigade, the head of the brigade, Mr. Zheng, asked Cao to write a confession. However, what Zheng didn't realize was that the person standing before him was someone who had been forced to lie on a torture bed for one month, and who had shocked the prison police because the more he was persecuted, the louder he would shout "Falun Dafa is good!" When questioned, Cao would only reply, "Here is Dafa practitioner Cao Jiguang!" Furious, Zheng slapped Cao twice across the face and then ordered some criminal prison inmates to drag him into a strictly monitored cell. There, Cao continued to firmly resist the persecution. He went on several hunger strikes, holding each one for so long that he began losing consciousness.
Cao faced the persecution with calm courage. He said to the police, "If you know of some new tricks, feel free to just try them out. We Dafa practitioners aren't afraid of anything." Without any new methods to persecute him, the police asked a criminal inmate to read to him from some material that defamed Falun Dafa, but Cao said that he wasn't listening.
The criminal inmate complained, "Since we are in this place together, we have to listen to the police. I also have no choice but to read this to you, but if you don't want to listen, I'll just read every other line." At first, Cao stuffed his ears with some paper, but then immediately realized that it was not the best solution.
He then grabbed the book and destroyed it, saying to the criminal, "They asked you to read this today. Tomorrow they will ask you to read other evil books, and that is not good for you." When the police learned of this, they handcuffed Cao behind his back and put him in solitary confinement for one month.
As he was being sent to the cell, Cao asked for a pen and some paper. He kept writing letters to the head of the prison and to police officers, telling them the facts about Falun Gong, as well as the principle that good is rewarded with good and evil is met with karmic retribution. He would write over a dozen pages in a single letter. Later, a policeman told the criminal inmates that as long as Cao was not breaking any of the prison rules, each should decide for themselves what they thought would be best for him. The criminals reasoned that if even the police could do nothing to him, then what could they possibly do?
Only those who were considered to be the toughest to handle were placed in the strictly monitored cell. However, they were all convinced and moved by Cao's righteous actions and steadfast will to persist in his belief. They would sit quietly while Cao was doing the Falun Gong exercises. Some would act as lookouts for him. After he finished the exercises, they would come up and talk with him. He would then tell them the facts about Falun Gong and sing songs to them. They admired him and said that he sang quite well. Cao told them how he was formerly a notorious playboy in Lingshui County until 1999, when he read Zhuan Falun and suddenly saw the light. He immediately understood many things and made up his mind at that point to wash himself clean of his previous habits. Soon after that, Falun Dafa began to be defamed, and Cao henceforth devoted his life to the course of Fa validation. After learning Cao's story, many inmates were surprised, and they began to admire the power of Falun Dafa that could steel one's will to that extent.
In other sections of Deyan Prison, practitioners also held righteous thoughts and maintained righteous actions. They asked for restoration of the reputations of Teacher and Falun Dafa, and for their own unconditional release. Falun Dafa practitioner Mr. Hu Gong, in Section No. 6, held a hunger strike, asking for the right to study Falun Gong teachings and to do the exercises. Other practitioners actively echoed his requests and held their own hunger strikes. That series of events sent shockwave through the Department of Prison Management.
On May 20 and 21, 2003, Deputy General Secretary of the Party in Sichuan Province, Mr. Li Congxi, visited Sichuan Female Prison and Deyang Prison and arranged activities to further persecute Falun Gong practitioners. At noon on May 23, Deyang Prison dispatched armed police to secretly transfer twelve practitioners to other facilities. In the afternoon, the Deyang Prison authorities deployed several machine guns on the prison wall and directed armed police to hold a so-called "tough discipline" conference, during which they announced seventeen new items added to the prison's punishment policy. The police announced the immediate transfer of practitioners Cao Jiguang, Xiao Hongmo, Fan Ning, Song Jinyin, Zhang Zongshan and Liang Junhua to Guangyuan Prison, and sent Zhang Zhigang and Xu Changzheng to Yibin Prison. Other practitioners were placed in solitary confinement under strict monitoring, or were transferred to other sections to perform hard labor.
As part of the punitive persecution, the No. 2 Brigade conducted drills that lasted from early morning to late evening. If a practitioner were too weak to run, police officers Qiu Shen and Cui Weigang would order one criminal inmate to pull the practitioner and another to push the practitioner from behind. Practitioners Zi Xubing and Zeng Yonghao were injured in falls they suffered due to this rough treatment, causing their bodies to become covered with bruises. Mr. Deng Weijian, a practitioner from Qing Baijiang, was forced to stand for seven days. Dafa practitioners in other sections were forced to perform manual labor for fifteen hours each day, were deprived of sleep in the chill of winter and they endured all manner of persecution.
The practitioners that were transferred to other prisons were not moved by the arrangements of the evil. They did what practitioners should do and carried out the mission of a Falun Dafa practitioner no matter where they found themselves. In August 2003, practitioner Cao Jiguang tore down a banner defaming Falun Dafa that hung inside Guangyuan Prison. The incident frightened the prison police into holding a so-called "criticizing conference" two days later, during which they openly beat Cao Jiguang. Later, practitioner Mr. Xiao Hongmo was also beaten. The police officers that participated in the beatings included those with surnames Gou and Miao.
Currently, more than ten practitioners are detained at Guangyuan Prison, including Xu Xiangdong and Xie Hongming, who were transferred there from Chengdu Detention Center. As soon as practitioner Xie Hongming was transferred to Guangyuan Prison, he erased a slogan on the wall that defamed Dafa with his towel. Several practitioners were beaten because of that incident.
In mid-January 2004, Deyang Prison authorities claimed that the Jingyan District Court in Deyang City had sentenced Falun Dafa practitioner Mr. Hu Gangsan to an additional three years in prison for allegedly "disturbing the prison order," a measure that sharply escalated the persecution of Falun Dafa practitioners.
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