(Minghui.org) Ms. Zhou Qian was at work on January 10, 2018 when a group of agents broke into her office and arrested her. They didn't show any ID or tell her company where they'd take her.

Ms. Zhou

The Shanghai resident's employer, Lloyd's Register Quality Assurance, notified her family, who immediately checked with the local police stations to try to locate her. She was nowhere to be found, and her family returned home to see fresh footprints and her Falun Gong books gone. They knew right away that police had ransacked their home when nobody was around.

Ms. Zhou credits Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline based on the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, for returning her to health. She was diagnosed with an ovarian tumor in 1993 while still a college student. She underwent chemotherapy and had to have her uterus and ovaries removed. In 1995, her mother recommended that she give Falun Gong a try after seeing her struggle with complications. She did, and her symptoms disappeared in just half a year.

Ms. Zhou never wavered in her faith after the Chinese communist regime launched the persecution of Falun Gong in July 1999. She became a target and was arrested several times.

Ms. Zhou's supervisor called her family at 5 p.m. on the day of her latest arrest and said that Weifang Police Station had just notified them of her whereabouts. Her family and three company executives rushed to the police station, only to be told that Ms. Zhou had just been transferred to Zhangjiang Detention Center, where she remains today.

Ms. Zhou's lawyer, Mr. Cheng Hai, visited the police station on February 5, but officer Huang Hao, who was assigned to the case, refused to meet with him and instructed security to block him outside. Mr. Cheng filed a complaint and Huang agreed to talk to him on the phone.

Huang claimed that they arrested Ms. Zhou because they suspected that she mailed out some Falun Gong materials to police chief Liu Jin in 2017. Huang alleged that the handwriting on the envelope looked like Ms. Zhou's, but he didn't have any forensic evidence.

Back in 2001, Ms. Zhou was sentenced to more than 3 years in prison after police suspected that she mailed out Falun Gong materials to some local police and officials. No forensic evidence was ever found to substantiate the claim against her.

Ms. Zhou's family couldn't believe that the police were playing the same trick again.

Officer Huang refused to meet with Ms. Zhou's family to discuss her case. They tried to file a complaint against him with Pudong Police Department's Appeals Office, but the agency refused to take their case.

By law, the longest term that a person can be detained before an indictment must be filed is 29 days (15 days of administrative detention and 14 days of criminal detention). Ms. Zhou has been detained beyond the legally permissible term. Her lawyer, Mr. Chen, mailed out his legal opinion to officer Huang and prosecutor Zhang Xueying on March 10. He asked them to immediately terminate the illegal detention of his client.

In the meantime, Mr. Cheng is in the process of filing criminal complaints against Huang, Zhang, and other responsible parties for arresting and detaining his client without any legal basis.