(Minghui.org) A woman in Nanchang City, Jiangxi Province, sued a former police chief after suffering three and a half years of unspeakable torture and abuse because of her practice of Falun Gong, a mind and body practice that has been persecuted in China since 1999.
Ms. Wu Zhiping’s ill husband and mother-in-law died while she was detained. The prison authorities denied her bail to see them for the last time.
Ms. Wu was near death when she was released from Jiangxi Women’s Prison in March 2019. She was severely underweight and had lost all of her teeth. She looked decades older than her actual age. Her cheeks were sunken and she suffered from memory loss and constant headaches. The slightest noise and sunlight irritated her.
The lawsuit was filed against Gu Guohua, the then police chief at Hongcheng Police Station, who was responsible for Ms. Wu's arrest and imprisonment.
The following is a brief summary of Ms. Wu's ordeal.
I was arrested on April 5, 2015, after the police saw me handing out information about Falun Gong. Although I was released after 15 days of criminal detention, the police continued to monitor me.
On June 5, 2015, I was arrested again after returning home from grocery shopping. Three officers from the Hongcheng Police Station forced me into a police vehicle and took me to the station.
I was interrogated and forced to submit to a medical exam. I pleaded with the police to release me, because I had to care for my husband, who had just been discharged from the hospital because of severe hypertension, as well as his bedridden 90-year-old mother. The police refused to let me go.
The next day they took me to the Nanchang City Detention Center. They also submitted my case to the Xihu Procuratorate.
The procuratorate approved my arrest on June 19, 2015. After being held at the detention center for a year and three months, I appeared in the Xihu District Court on September 2, 2016. My lawyer pled “not guilty” for me. I also testified in my own defense.
I was sentenced to three and a half years and taken to Jiangxi Women’s Prison.
The prison guards offered inmates rewards and reduced sentences in exchange for torturing and assaulting me. The inmates often tied my wrists to a metal bar and hung me up. They would suddenly drop me so that all my weight fell on my bound wrists. The pain was excruciating. When they hung me in the air, they would often push me and spin me around and then slam me into objects in the room. This made me very dizzy.
They lowered me to the floor and covered my nose and mouth in an attempt to suffocate me.
I was forced to work in a sweatshop during the day where prison staff played videos slandering Falun Gong. They then ordered me to repeat the slanderous narratives.
They placed me in isolation, where I was given one cup of water per day for drinking and washing up. I was only allowed to go to the toilet once a day.
At night, I was forced to sit on a small stool with my hands and legs tied until 2:00 a.m. Any attempt at sleep was difficult as they cuffed me to the bed frame at night. The handcuffs were fastened too tight, and it hurt tremendously.
Practitioners of Falun Gong who are imprisoned are required to write statements that denounce and defame the practice. I refused to do that and was sent back to isolation.
Again I was forced to stand all day and was hung up from the window frame in the evening.
Because I wasn’t allowed to use the toilet, I defecated on the floor. Four prisoners pulled my hair and struck me, with many blows to my face and head. The beating was so severe that the pain lingered. Even now, I suffer from severe headaches as a result.
My husband had severe hypertension. Because I was imprisoned for years, he also lived in constant fear and worried about me and the torture I had to endure. He died after my arrest in 2015.
When I learned of this, I couldn't control my emotions and went to the guards to demand my release. They were cold to my grief. I was put in isolation for a third time.
I was forced to stand during the day and squat through the night. Inmates beat me and slammed me against the floor repeatedly. I was kept in isolation and tortured every day for three months.
Inmates forced me to stand for 17 hours straight—from 7 a.m. to midnight—and refused to let me use the toilet unless I cursed my faith.
My mother-in-law also died when I was in prison. She was in her 90s and was paralyzed. Her health deteriorated after the persecution began and when I was so frequently arrested and detained.
After being arrested in October 2008, I was sent to Jiangxi Women’s Prison in June 2009 for three years.
I was publicly humiliated while tied to a pole. The guards put me in solitary confinement with toxic chemicals in the room. I was dizzy and had difficulty breathing. It felt like my heart almost stopped beating.
I was denied breakfast and forced to stand still for hours each day. I was also monitored around the clock.
Because of the long-term abuse, I had blood in my urine and back pain. I couldn’t stand up straight and had to walk bent over.
Woman Tortured for Her Faith in Detention Center, Ill Husband Dies Without Her Care
Ms. Wu Zhiping Tortured in the Jiangxi Women's Prison
55 Falun Gong Practitioners Still Incarcerated in Jiangxi Province Women’s Prison