(Clearwisdom.net) The so-called "Changchun City Xinglongshan Legal System Education Center" is actually a brainwashing center located at a special secondary school situated in a Changchun City suburb. It was established in early 2001 but disbanded in less than a year. It managed to conduct only one session. This brainwashing center utilized the following methods:

The surroundings were piled with rubble and covered with dry grass. In order to spruce the place up for a delegation of visiting authorities coming for inspection, great expenses were incurred to clean up, whitewash, erect posters, and to reconstruct in a big way. Externally, the place took on an entirely new look after all the rubble and weeds were cleared away. The doors and verandahs were beautiful to look at. On the door were hung couplets written in large artistic calligraphy on red cloth and a horizontal scroll bearing pretty inscriptions hung across the top of the door. It was as if it were ready for New Year celebrations. Blackboards hung on the walls of the verandahs with elegant handwriting on them. Every room displayed various "rules and regulations" in frames. The rooms were filled with articles that were neatly arranged. The environment indeed appeared to be cozy and inviting.

However, these were presented only as a fa?ade. In fact, the hygiene at this place was putrid. The rooms were filled with foul odors. The beds were rickety and noisy. The policemen residing upstairs would intentionally pour dirty water, fruit peels and trash outside the windows of the dormitory of the Falun Gong practitioners on the ground floor. The water often seeped through onto the beds on the ground floor, wetting the mattresses and blankets. There were many buckets placed on the beds to catch the filthy dripping water from above. The rooms stank, practitioners developed scabies and the itching was very difficult to endure. When the police officers entered the building, they used their feet to kick open the doors, not willing to use their hands on the doors, as they were afraid of catching diseases. At night, there were insects that crawled all over the practitioners. They were forced to keep awake to try and catch the insects.

As for food, the brainwashing center provided the Falun Gong practitioners with small meals and boiled water. The rice was often contaminated with rat droppings. The food was revolting and inedible. For appearances sake, there was a large pail of boiled water in the verandah, but the practitioners seldom had the chance to drink from it. They were denied access to refill the water. When elderly practitioners went to get water, they were ordered by the guards to hide the buckets outside and they were forbidden to tell anyone where the water was. The practitioners never had a chance to drink the boiled water.

2. Using Violence to Stifle Talking

The Falun Gong practitioners lost their personal freedom and dignity at the brainwashing center. They were subjected to surveillance, assault and various methods of severe torment, both physical and mental. The brainwashing center feared the exposure of their actions and tried to intimidate the practitioners from reporting their criminal acts.

For example, Falun Gong practitioners were treated like criminals at the brainwashing center. They must sit in an upright position on the side of the bed, forbidden to speak, move or communicate with each other. When needing to wash their faces or go to the toilet, they were required to shout "report", and they would be allotted a given time for those purposes. Whether they had enough time to relieve themselves was not taken into account. There was a Ms. Su who had bowel problems and had to visit the toilet four or five times, and when the given time was exceeded, the policewoman would shout herself hoarse to hurry Ms. Su to return to her place.

Being beaten up at this location was a common routine. Ms. Su was beaten up and kicked with leather boots for practicing Falun Gong six months ago. The injuries on her legs are still clearly visible. An older lady from Nanhu New Village was beaten badly by a policewoman who was especially transferred from the notorious Heizuizi Prison. The lady's inner thighs were severely bruised. The pain was excruciating and difficult to bear. She cried out in pain and could not care for herself any longer. She lost control of her bowels and often could not make it to the toilet in time. Some practitioners were also beaten so badly that their clothes were torn to shreds. Even their faces were beaten beyond recognition, all because they practiced the Falun Gong exercises or spoke a few words in its favor!

The practitioners also suffered mental torture. The brainwashing center forced these good people to abandon their belief in "Zhen, Shan, and Ren" ("Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance"), to watch and listen to video and audio recordings that vilified Dafa and Teacher, to read books that slander Dafa, and to listen to "reports" vilifying Dafa. The center was also trying to find former practitioners who had turned against Dafa to try to brainwash the practitioners. The Center even brought in the notorious Wang Zhigang (the director of the Anti-cult Association, Jilin Province, member of the Air Force "610 Office"(1). He wrote two books in collaboration with another Anti-cult Association member, Song Jianfeng, that are being used by the several hundred forced labor camps, prisons, political and judiciary committees, "610 Offices", brainwashing centers in dozens of provinces, autonomous regions, the city-controlled forced labor camps and brainwashing centers as the main teaching material) to the Center to tell lies, use facts out of context, distort facts, spread rumors and so on to vilify Teacher and Dafa. He was immediately denounced and exposed by the Dafa practitioners at the brainwashing center.

The police officers fabricated lies about the detained practitioners, saying that "practicing Dafa brought problems upon their families, their work units, and were living at the center free from the chores of looking after their children and doing house work. They were also not required to report for work and had plenty to eat and drink...." They turned the facts upside down when they said that the practitioners came of their own free will and accord, when, in fact, they were brought in handcuffs! The practitioners were not allowed proper sleep at night because of roll calls every now and then or the dormitory door being kicked open. During lunchtime they would bring in relatives of the practitioners to try to make the practitioners waver. On one occasion, the wife of an elderly practitioner cried loudly as instructed by the police officers. It shocked all the practitioners in the dormitories. On another occasion, twin children were brought in to kneel in front of their mother to beg her to give up her belief in accordance to the wishes of the police. The police officers had indeed racked their brains in finding ways to make the practitioners suffer mentally.

However, no matter whether they tormented the Falun Gong practitioners physically or mentally, they never shook their will. As the perpetrators feared that their crimes would be exposed, they spared no effort in concealing them. One of the methods was to beat up the practitioners to keep them silent.

Once, reporters went to the Center to gather information. Ms. Zang Hong, a practitioner from the Agriculture College, Jilin Province, about 30, said just one sentence: "In this place there is no freedom to wash one's face or visit the toilet." Before she could say any more about the situation there, there was great panic amongst the officers of the center. After the reporters left, the Deputy Section Head of the first office at the Public Security Department Zhang Zhengzhen's face bloated in anger. He viciously slapped Ms. Zang Hong's face several times and said: "This will teach you to want freedom! Do you still want freedom?"

Not long after that, it was announced that top officials would visit the center for an inspection. Zhang began to beat up the practitioners in the various rooms. After dinner Zhang would be drunk and would be heard in various rooms with his abusive language, threats and asking while beating up the practitioners: "When the top officials come, will you shout out?" Even the practitioners who kept quiet were beaten up. When Li (about forty years-old) refused to answer, Zhang twisted her arms behind her back, leaving her unable to care for herself for a long period of time after the assault. She had difficulty coping with the pain. When the officials visited, the perpetrators assembled all the Dafa practitioners in the main assembly hall to listen to Wang Zhigang's ranting. He knew that he was unable to advance any arguments to justify himself and in order to idle away time, he made the practitioners write down questions on slips of paper for his consideration. As it turned out, the practitioners were able to use the opportunity to point out his crimes to him.

There was an uproar in the brainwashing center after Ms. Zang Hong was severely beaten up. Those officers involved in the beating thought of another ruse, using the pretense of "observing the feelings of the public and soliciting opinions". The Administration of Justice Section Director Wang went to the practitioners to "seek their opinion on room for improvement for the officers." The practitioners brought up a series of problems that violated the Constitution, laws and regulations, and the crimes of assault, physical abuse and so on. After this, not only did the vile actions at the brainwashing center continue, they were intensified. They continuously beat up the practitioners for days, and accused an elderly lady who spoke up earlier as the "ring leader." Once, officers crept into the various dormitories when the practitioners were all gathered elsewhere, placing incriminating literature on their beds. They then made video recordings of the planted evidence to present to their senior officers.

In short, the authorities at the Xinglongshan Brainwashing Center, Changchun City, fear exposure of their crimes and are willing to do anything to conceal them. There were also some police officers that realized their mistakes and stopped persecuting practitioners. After many practitioners walked out with their righteous thoughts, the first session of the brainwashing center collapsed and fell apart.

(1) "610 Office": a bureau specifically created by the Chinese government to persecute Falun Gong. It has absolute power over each level of administration in the Party, as well as over the political and judiciary branches.