March 30, 2004

Ms. Huang Jingping worked at a fabric factory in Changsha City, Hunan Province. At 50 years old, many of her diseases were healed after learning Falun Gong. After the persecution against Falun Gong started, she went to Beijing several times to exercise her constitutional right to appeal on behalf of Falun Gong. In Beijing she was detained and beaten severely by the authorities, which caused her serious physical injury. On one occasion Huang was released from the labor camp when her health deteriorated significantly. After her release, she was still harassed and threatened by officials from the local "610 Office" (1) and police from the local precinct. On February 27, 2004 she passed away.

Huang Jingping started to practice Falun Gong in 1997. Each day one could see her health improving in many areas. She started to look healthy and was even able to take a shower with cold water. A rare problem of uterine bleeding, which doctors originally thought to be some form of cancer, completely disappeared. Her great recovery made people remark that she looked like a new person.

After July 20, 1999, when Jiang and his followers started the persecution of Falun Gong, Huang Jingping went to Beijing to appeal on four different occasions. While in Beijing, she was put into detention where she was verbally abused and severely beaten, causing visible wounds over her entire body, including her face. In December 2000, she displayed a banner in Tiananmen Square. Knocked down to the pavement, she was severely beaten by the police, resulting in bruises and swelling to both her eyes from being struck in the face. When representatives from her hometown of Changsha went to pick her up, they were shocked at the sight of her and were afraid to take her back for fear that due to her poor physical condition they might be held responsible should something happen. A month passed before they agreed to take her back. After the torture, Huang Jingping was extremely thin, with a deep scar on one side of her nose and dark purple frostbitten hands. Because she refused to give up practicing Falun Gong, she was detained in the Yuelu region local precinct detention center at Changsha City for nearly two months. Later, she was sent to the Baimalong Labor Camp at Zhuzhou. In the labor camp, she was infected with pulmonary tuberculosis. Her condition became very serious. She was not released back to Changsha until June 2001.

Once she returned home, she was harassed and persecuted by the local "610 Office," police station and government officials because she continued to refuse to renounce her belief in Falun Gong. The director of the "610 Office" from Yuelu region named Shu, was especially vicious. He often ordered his assistant to pressure Ms. Huang with repeated threatening telephone calls. They also went to her husband's school and threatened him. The city education committee and the hospital also joined in and made threats. They also tried to force her to write statements renouncing her belief. They said if she refused to give up her practice of Falun Gong, they would force her into a brainwashing program and charge her four thousand Yuan a month for being there.

The corrupt officials threatened and hounded Ms. Huang through their own moral bankruptcy. When Huang Jingping was being detained in Beijing, various officials from the factory, local government and police stations, went to Beijing to bring her back to her hometown and used the excuse of "picking her up" to take a sightseeing trip around the city. The officials stayed at expensive hotels, dined out, drank and partied, charging all the expenses to Huang Jingping. She only received a tiny 200 Yuan per month as living expenses.

Under the intense pressure, Huang Jingping's mind and body were damaged beyond repair. On February 27, 2004, her illness became worse and she succumbed to it.

Huang Jingping's death brought great pain to the family. Her child was not even 15. Suffering intense grief due to his wife's death, Ms. Huang's husband fell ill and has not recovered. He is still unable to work.