(Minghui.org) Two Jinzhou City, Liaoning Province residents were sentenced to prison in late July 2022 for practicing Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
The lawyer representing both Ms. Guo Shufen and Mr. Jia Jingwen was notified by judge Xu Bing of Linghai City Court of their verdicts on July 31, 2022. Ms. Guo was sentenced to two years and three months, while Mr. Jia was given seven years.
Linghai is under the administration of Jinzhou, the second largest city in Liaoning Province. Since July 2020, the authorities have designated the Linghai City Procuratorate and Linghai City Court to handle all Falun Gong cases in the Jinzhou region, as a way to expedite the prosecution process. At least 20 Falun Gong practitioners have been sentenced since then.
Ms. Guo Shufen
Ms. Guo Shufen saw a Falun Gong poster on a utility pole on December 9, 2021. When she stopped to read it, a woman accused her of putting up the poster. She refused to let her go and called the police, who soon arrived and took Ms. Guo to the Beijiao Police Station.
An hour later, over ten plainclothes officers descended on Ms. Guo’s home. They kicked the door open and broke in. Her daughter and granddaughter, who live with her, were terrified. The police confiscated Ms. Guo’s Falun Gong books, incense, several DVDs, and 12,000 yuan in cash. They also took away three printers and three computers that her son-in-law used for his private business. Even her granddaughter’s DVD player wasn’t spared.
The police submitted Ms. Guo’s case to the Linghai City Procuratorate on December 14, 2021. The prosecutor indicted her on December 21, with the charge of “undermining law enforcement with a cult organization,” the standard pretext used by the authorities to criminalize Falun Gong practitioners.
Ms. Guo stood trial on July 6, 2022, and was sentenced to two years and three months.
Mr. Jia Jingwen
Mr. Jia Jingwen, 66, was arrested on December 19, 2021, by Li Lei, deputy head of Taihe District Domestic Security Office. Many of his personal belonging were confiscated. The police submitted his case to the Linghai City Procuratorate on February 20, 2022. He was tried jointly with Ms. Guo and sentenced to seven years.
Mr. Jia took up Falun Gong in August 1995. He credits the practice for helping him to quit smoking and gambling. Because he refused to renounce his faith in the persecution, he has been repeatedly arrested and given two labor camp terms, before being handed down the latest seven-year prison sentence.
Mr. Jia was first arrested in mid-August 1999 and detained for two weeks. For visiting another practitioner at the local lockup on the second day of his release, he was arrested again and detained for another 30 days. He was constantly beaten by the police during that time. He held a hunger strike to protest the persecution and was released six days later.
Mr. Jia went to Beijing to appeal for the right to practice Falun Gong on October 27, 1999. He was arrested and held in a hotel. The police stripped his clothes and whipped him with a leather belt, attempting to force him to reveal the names and addresses of practitioners in Beijing he knew of.
As he remained silent, the police whipped his private part and said, “We are the thugs.” Another officer stuffed his mouth with a smelly shoe and didn’t remove it until he almost suffocated. When he still refused to say anything, they used a rope to tie up his private part and then pulled it. After four hours of torture, Mr. Jia kept vomiting. Only then did the torture stop.
Mr. Jia was then transferred to the Jinzhou City No.1 Detention Center. He suffered injuries to his ribs and was unable to lie down for a month.
Li Xiejiang, an agent of the Jinzhou City 610 Office, went to Mr. Jia’s home in October 2000 and attempted to arrest him. It happened that Mr. Jia wasn’t home. After his wife escaped, she informed him not to come back.
After a year of displacement to hide from the police, the couple was arrested in August 2002 and taken to the Jinzhou City No.2 Detention Center. The inmates were instigated by the guards to beat them. Mr. Jia held a hunger strike to protest and they were released seven days later. Since then, the couple was forced into displacement again and the local police suspended their household registration.
While putting up a banner with information about Falun Gong on the early morning of April 27, 2004, Mr. Jia was reported by a taxi driver and arrested. He was taken to the Jinzhou City Lockup that evening and later given three years of forced labor. He was taken to the Jinzhou Forced Labor Camp on April 29, 2004.
In the first four months, he was locked in solitary confinement. The guards once tied him to a metal chair for three days. He held a hunger strike to protest the persecution and was force-fed. To increase his suffering, the guards pulled the feeding tube back and forth through his nostril and stomach.
On September 21, 2004, because Mr. Jia refused to read statements smearing Falun Gong, the guards tied up his legs and burnt his fingernails, toenails, hands, and feet with cigarette butts. Another officer hit his ankles and knees, causing the joints to become black and blue. Mr. Jia was unable to bend his legs for three weeks as a result.
An inmate filled a water bottle with human waste, put it right under his nose, and forced him to breathe it.
Mr. Jia was later transferred to the Benxi Forced Labor Camp, where he was tied up in a spread eagle position on a bed for 13 days.
Mr. Jia was arrested again on January 27, 2010, and taken to the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp. It’s not clear how long he was detained there.
Perpetrators’ contact information:
Xu Bing (许冰), judge of Linghai City Court: +86-416-8152021, +86-18941603995Zhang Fengwu (张凤武), president of Linghai City Court: +86-416-8152001Xue Weiwei (薛伟巍), presiding of Linghai City Procuratorate: +86-416-8182177, +86-416-5528128, +416-13332188885Zhan Zhuo (詹卓), prosecutor of Linghai City Procuratorate: +86-18941601275, +86-416-8107121
(More perpetrators’ contact information is available in the original Chinese article.)
Related report:
Jinzhou City, Liaoning Province: Seventeen Arrested in 23 Days
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