(Minghui.org) Ms. Lei Xiuxiang used to live a tiring life, as she had trouble getting along with her husband and mother-in-law. She was also plagued with various illnesses. Twice she contemplated suicide, but stopped at the last minute because of her small children.
Just as she was in despair, she encountered Falun Gong and became a practitioner in 1998. She regained her health soon afterwards, and began to enjoy a harmonious family.
Her happy life, however, was soon shattered after the Chinese Communist Party launched its nationwide campaign against Falun Gong in 1999. Simply for following Falun Gong's principle of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance to be a good person, she was arrested many times and suffered brutal torture while in detention.
In particular, she spent a total of four and a half years serving three terms in the same labor camp during the period of 2006-2013. As she refused to renounce her belief in Falun Gong, she was once force-fed and drugged for 30 days straight. Another time she was restrained to a bed in a spread-eagle position and suffered excruciating pain.
The 56-year-old woman from Jilin City, Jilin Province has no regrets despite her ordeals. “Being a good person is not a crime,” said Ms. Lei. She is determined to tell the public how wrong the Chinese regime is in persecuting law-abiding citizens simply for their belief that causes no harm to society.
Below, Ms. Lei recounts her three-term labor camp experience.
Three Terms of Forced Labor in 7 Years
The police's earliest attempt to send me to a labor camp began in March 2006, right after I finished an illegal 15-day detention at a local detention center. They however had to release me after I failed the medical examination required for labor camp admission.
I was arrested again on June 7, 2006 and sent to the Jilin Province Women's Forced Labor Camp (also known as Changchun Heizuizi Women's Labor Camp) the same day. I wasn't released until December 2007.
Right before the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the police took me into custody on July 13 and sent me to a make-shift brainwashing center in a local hotel. They beat me when I refused to curse Falun Gong and its founder, or to sit on Falun Gong books.
Not long afterwards, I was transferred to the same labor camp and kept there until the end of 2009.
My third labor camp incarceration began at the end of May 2011 after the police ransacked my home. Once again, I was sent to the Jilin Province Women's Labor Camp. I didn't regain my freedom until January 7, 2013.
All three labor camp detentions saw me brutally tortured for refusing to renounce Falun Gong.
30-Day Force-feeding
I was force-fed many times as I went on hunger strikes to protest the illegal detention and request my release.
Once a group of guards and inmates pushed me down and inserted a non-medical-use tube into my nose. My esophagus and stomach were injured. Afterward, my stomach ached badly, and I felt nauseous. I vomited a lot of bloody bubbles.
Torture re-enactment: brutal forced-feeding
At another time, when I resisted the force-feeding, the division chief banged my head on the ground repeatedly. I was in so much pain that I almost lost consciousness.
When I started another hunger strike later, I was force-fed for 30 days straight. The guards cuffed my hands and feet to a bed during the day for force-feeding and didn't let me down until night time. The next morning, however, would see me cuffed to the bed again. The torture lasted a whole month. My buttocks festered as I had to relieve myself in bed.
I was injected with an unknown drug during one of these force-feeding episodes. I could not fall sleep the whole night, and my stomach was bloated.
During my third-term labor camp incarceration, I once knocked a food bowl to the ground on purpose upon learning from an inmate that the food was laced with unknown drugs. The camp doctor was livid and fed me with the same food collected from the ground. I was then handcuffed to a radiator or a chair every day. Once, I had to drag the chair with me to go to the restroom.
Electric Shocks and Stretching Torture
I was taken to the hospital for an examination every week during my 2006-2007 labor camp detention, but I doubted the purpose was for my well-being. Every time they dragged me into the hospital, I yelled, “Falun Dafa is good!” For this, I was brutally beaten. Every time I was taken back to the labor camp, I was beaten and shocked by electric batons. I lost consciousness from the torture.
Right after I was admitted to the labor camp for the third time, the guards stripped off my clothes and cuffed one of my hands to a bed. They shocked me with an electric baton before stamping my fingerprint on some paperwork.
To protest my illegal detention, I refused to wear labor camp uniforms, but covered myself with a bed sheet. Later, my undershirts, underpants, and bed sheets were taken away. I was left with only my underwear. Even my shoes were taken away.
During Chinese New Year of 2012, officials from supervising agencies visited the labor camp. All of us detainees were gathered in a big room. When they entered, I yelled out to them, “Falun Gong practitioners did not commit any crimes, but we're being persecuted here. Being a good person is not a crime. You spend your Chinese New Year with your family, but we have to be separated from them.” The visitors did not say anything. After they left, three division chiefs dragged me to a room without surveillance cameras and beat me.
In September 2012, “collaborators,” former practitioners who had been forced into turning against Falun Gong, were brought in to assist in forcing practitioners to renounce their belief. Steadfast practitioners were subjected to the “stretching bed” torture and shocked with electric batons.
On the stretching bed, practitioners' hands and feet were tied to the four corners, which suspended their bodies in the air. They were not released to go to the restrooms. They were in excruciating pain, and many of them became disabled as a result. Some were unable to bear the torture and gave in to the authorities' demands.
Torture Re-enactment: Stretching bed
I was unable to bear the pain after being tortured on the stretching bed for two mornings. I lost sensation in two of my fingers. Against my will, I wrote the statement to give up practicing Falun Gong.
After I was released, I continued to practice Falun Gong and did the exercises. My fingers soon recovered.
List of Perpetrators:
Dachangtun Police Station:Fang Bin (方斌) and Gao Yang (高阳), former directors
Jilin Province Women's Forced Labor Camp:Jin Lihua (金立华), Zhu Dan (朱丹), Li Xiaohua (李晓华), Wang Zhufeng (王珠峰), Feng Xiaochun (风晓春), Wang Jing (王晶), Zhang Xiaohui (张晓辉), Zhang Guimei (张桂梅)
Jilin City Brainwashing Center:Shen Hongquan (沈洪泉), Zhu Jiahui (祝家辉)
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