(Minghui.org) A woman in Jianping County, Liaoning Province, was recently sentenced to four years for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Ms. Feng Ruiying, 50, was arrested while doing housework on November 18, 2021. She was held in Chaoyang Detention Center and indicted by the Jianping County Procuratorate. She was tried in the Jianping County Court on July 22, 2022, and sentenced to four years with a 20,000-yuan fine. She was admitted to Masanjia Prison.
Ms. Feng’s latest arrest was preceded by her previous arrest with another practitioner, Ms. Hu Guiqin, on September 25, 2020, after both women were reported for talking to people about Falun Gong. The police raided her home and broke into her locked cabinets. All of her Falun Gong items and valuables were confiscated. Her mother-in-law, in her 70s, knelt in front of the police and begged them not to arrest her, but to no avail.
Both Ms. Feng and Ms. Hu were released on bail in the afternoon. Each of them paid a 1,500-yuan bond, but the police refused to give them a receipt.
When the police arrested Ms. Feng again in November 2021, they also attempted to arrest Ms. Hu. But she wasn’t home at the time. It’s not clear if the police arrested Ms. Hu later on or whether she was subjected to prosecution.
Ms. Feng’s sentencing left her family in a dire situation, especially her parents-in-law, who relied on her for care. Her father-in-law has cerebellar atrophy and is deaf. Her mother-in-law wears a bag around her waist to collect her waste after a section of her intestine was removed due to intestinal obstruction.
Ms. Feng took up Falun Gong in November 1997. She credits the practice for curing her many ailments, including a heart condition, headaches, and joint pain. Because she wouldn’t give up Falun Gong despite the persecution, she has been repeatedly arrested, harassed and monitored by the authorities.
Following an arrest in October 1999, she was detained for 15 days. When she was arrested again in December 2000 for going to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong, she was beaten, verbally abused, and forced to do unpaid labor during nearly one year of detention.