(Minghui.org) Five residents of Daqing City, Heilongjiang Province were arrested by over 50 officers on July 9, 2020 for their faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999. They were all sentenced in December 2020 and admitted to Heilongjiang Women’s Prison in September 2021.

The five practitioners, along with two other practitioners jailed in the same prison, are confirmed to have been subjected to various forms of torture.

Arrests and Prison Sentences

The Public Security Department of Heilongjiang Province, the Daqing City Police Department, and the Lindian Police Department dispatched over 50 officers to arrest Ms. Xue Liwei, Ms. Lu Chaobo, Ms. Dong Na, Ms. Chen Weibo, and Ms. Wang Yuhong, on July 9, 2020. The practitioners’ homes were ransacked, and they were interrogated.

Ms. Lu was released on bail the next day due to some heart and leg problems. The four other practitioners were taken to Dumeng County Detention Center. Ms. Dong was released on bail ten days later. Ms. Lu and Ms. Dong were arrested again on August 11, 2020 and taken to the Dumeng County Detention Center.

The practitioners were transferred to Daqing City No. 2 Detention Center on August 16, and sentenced on December 23, 2020. Ms. Lu and Ms. Wang were sentenced to 7 years and fined 70,000 yuan each. Ms. Chen and Ms. Xue were sentenced to 4 years and fined 40,000 yuan each. Ms. Dong was sentenced to 3.5 years and fined 30,000 yuan.

Ms. Wang and Ms. Lu appealed the sentence but their appeals were rejected.

All five practitioners were taken to the training team in Heilongjiang Women’s Prison on September 14, 2021.

After the training ended in October 2021, the practitioners were sent to Team 12 of Division 8. The inmates made them stand in the water room, restroom, and warehouse. They were also forced to sit on small stools and repeatedly ordered to renounce their faith.

Ms. Xue was transferred to cell 510 after the prison moved to a new building. She was sent to cell 509 on January 2, 2022, where Ms. Lu was held.

In addition to the above-mentioned five practitioners, two other practitioners who were sentenced earlier are also being tortured in Heilongjiang Women’s Prison. Ms. Zhang Shuzhi was sentenced to 5.5 years on April 18, 2018 and Ms. Wang Jianhui to 5 years and a 30,000 yuan fine on June 3, 2021.

Below are more details about the previous and current persecution they suffer.

Ms. Xue Liwei

Ms. Xue Liwei, 48, a mathematics teacher at the Lindian County No. 2 Middle School, started practicing Falun Gong in 2007. Because she filed a lawsuit against former communist regime head Jiang Zemin for ordering the persecution of Falun Gong, she was arrested on October 22, 2015. She was detained for 15 days and fined 1,000 yuan.

On September 2, 2019, officers from the Political and Legal Affairs Committee went to Ms. Xue’s school and harassed her. They asked if she had been telling facts about Falun Gong to the students and teachers.

Ms. Lu Chaobo and Ms. Chen Weibo

Ms. Lu Chaobo, 51, is an elementary school teacher in Lindian County. She lives by Falun Gong’s principles and was praised for being a good teacher.

Ms. Lu was arrested on October 22, 2015 for filing a criminal complaint against Jiang Zemin. She was detained for 15 days and fined 1,000 yuan.

She was arrested at a train station by police officers from Xizhan Police Station on April 4, 2018 and body-searched in the police room. She was asked if she knew another practitioner who was imprisoned. Her personal belongings were confiscated. The police took her car keys away to ransack her car. The whole process lasted over two hours.

Ms. Lu was arrested on July 9, 2020 and later sentenced to a seven-year prison term and taken to Heilongjiang Women’s Prison. After the prison moved to a new building, she was taken to Team 9 and assigned to room 509. The inmate in-charge monitors the practitioners and often reports them to the guards.

Ms. Chen Weibo, 46, is a teacher in Lindian County. She was sentenced to 4 years and held at room 502 in Heilongjiang Women’s Prison after the prison moved to a new building.

Ms. Dong Na

Ms. Dong Na, 53, is an art teacher in Lindian County. She was sentenced to 3.5 years and fined 30,000 yuan.

Ms. Dong was taken to Heilongjiang Women’s Prison in early 2021, where she was forced to sit on a small stool when she refused to write guarantee statements to renounce her faith. An inmate kicked her, and other inmates tried to force her to renounce her faith. She was transferred from Team 5 to Team 14, and later to Team 11 within a month.

Two bunk beds were pushed against each other to sleep six inmates, three on the top bunk and three on the bottom. Ms. Dong was assigned to sleep in between two other inmates on the upper bunk bed. The two inmates were given foam pads and mattresses, but Ms. Dong had nothing to sleep on. An inmate later gave her a very thin and small blanket, equivalent to the size of a blanket used by babies.

Ms. Dong had to wait for either of her two bedmates to say ok before she could climb up to the top bunk from their side of the bunk bed. If any of the six people (sharing the top and bottom bunk beds) had to use the restroom at night, everyone would be awakened from the beds shaking. Seeing how tired everyone was after working all day, she was reluctant to wake them up in the middle of the night to use the restroom. As a result, she could not sleep well and developed very high blood pressure.

Ms. Dong was also forced to do labor work. She was made to make fake eyelashes without resting.

Torture illustration: Doing labor work in prison

Ms. Wang Yuhong

Ms. Wang Yuhong, 55, worked as an accountant at a seed shop in Daqing City. She was arrested repeatedly and detained for the past 22 years. Her salary was also suspended.

In December 1999, Ms. Wang was detained for 12 days for signing on a “Falun Dafa is good” banner.

She was arrested and detained for three months in December 31, 2000. Her salary was suspended and her employment was terminated. The police added an additional three months and five days to her detention. She was released in July 2001 and had to pay 3,000 yuan for bail. Her job was not reinstated.

Ms. Wang was arrested on May 3, 2017 after she filed a criminal complaint against Jiang Zemin. She was detained for 15 days and fined 1,000 yuan.

She was arrested again on July 9, 2020 and sentenced to 7 years. She was fined 7,000 yuan, and taken to Heilongjiang Women’s Prison on September 14, 2021.

Related reports:

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Ms. Zhang Shuzhi

Ms. Zhang Shuzhi, 72, used to suffer from several illnesses before practicing Falun Gong in 1996. She is known for being a good person.

Ms. Zhang and her daughter, Ms. Hou Xiaoyan, were arrested in 1999 for going to Beijing to appeal for the right to practice Falun Gong. They were detained at Daqing City Detention Center for a month after being arrested on October 18. They were later transferred to Datong District Detention Center and held for 15 days.

In February 2000, Ms. Zhang was detained in Datong District Detention Center for several days. She was arrested again on June 1, 2001 for putting up Falun Gong materials. She was held in Heilongjiang Province Drug Rehabilitation Labor Camp.

Ms. Zhang was sentenced to 4 years in Heilongjiang Province in 2005.

Ms. Zhang and Ms. Hou were arrested on October 10, 2017 and taken to Harbin No. 2 Detention Center. They were sentenced to 5.5 years and 5 years respectively after appearing in court on April 18, 2018. They are currently serving time in Heilongjiang Women’s Prison.

On the first day when Ms. Zhang arrived at Team 13 of Division 8, the inmates made her sit on a small stool in the water room and warehouse. On the following days, she was forced to sit on a small stool every day to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong. A month later, she was taken to team 16 and later to team 19. The persecution caused Ms. Zhang to have blurred vision in both eyes, and her family had to fork out money for her to undergo surgery. Currently, she still has blurred vision in one eye.

When the prison moved to a new building in November 2021, Ms. Zhang was assigned to room 604.

Several inmates forced all practitioners to watch videos every day that slandered Falun Gong, or listen to seminar on other religions. Practitioners, regardless if they are feeling unwell, were required to attend the sessions and could not lower their heads or blink their eyes. They also needed to sit up straight or risk being humiliated in front of everyone and reported to the captain, which would result in other inmates being implicated and having their points deducted.

Practitioners were also forced to write learning reports once a week.

Related report:

Elderly Mother and Daughter Serving Time for Practicing Falun Gong, Denied Family Visits

Ms. Wang Jianhui

Twenty Falun Gong practitioners in the Heilongjiang Women’s Prison were tortured in the restroom, drying room, water room, bathroom, and the warehouse in February 2022. They were made to sit on small stools, forced to stand or hold back from urinating, exposed to freezing weather, beaten, and deprived of sleep. Previously, the practitioners were allowed to retrieve their clothes from the drying room or wash their clothes. After being restricted, they had to wash their clothes in the cell or restroom, and shower in the cell. The inmates monitoring them dried or retrieved their clothes.

The practitioners were forced to sit in an upright position. They were previously told to sit facing the corridor. As the two cells’ doors face each other, the inmate in-charge then instructed the practitioners to sit facing the window. They were not allowed to look out of the door even during meal time, or go to other rooms.

Every cell has two sinks outside the corridor. One is for inmates to wash their bowls, wash up, or get water, and another is for urinating. There is a small room between the two sinks. A bed is placed inside the room and the electric door is controlled by the guards. The door will close when practitioners are being beaten or punished as the guards are scared that other practitioners would see the torture.

Torture illustration: Beaten and head banged against the wall

The new building has very advanced surveillance equipment with no blind spots. No guards would appear if practitioners were being beaten. But if the practitioners shouted “Falun Dafa is good,” the electric door of the cell would immediately be closed.

When practitioners were ordered to go to the lobby to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong, they were guarded by two inmates, one in front and one behind. If two practitioners happened to be together, the captain might be punished. Previously, practitioners were not required to watch the daily propaganda news by the China Central TV Station in the evening, but the rules later changed and everyone must now watch the news.

On January 2, 2022, inmate Fan Xiumei was appointed to manage 100 inmates on the sixth floor while her predecessor, Sun Jing, was transferred to the second floor to be in-charge of persecuting practitioners.

Due to the poor living conditions in the prison, many inmates participated in persecuting the practitioners without restraint in exchange for term reductions. They were also rewarded with lunch boxes, food ordered from outside restaurants, fruits, and more time to call their families. The guards turned a blind eye even if they witnessed practitioners being tortured.

Ms. Wang Jianhui, 50, worked as a hospital technician in Daqing Oilfield General Hospital. She was arrested on the afternoon of November 22, 2020, and detained at the Daqing City No. 2 Detention Center. She was sentenced to 5 years and fined 30,000 yuan on June 3, 2021, and transferred to Heilongjiang Women’s Prison in early 2022.

Practitioners once heard someone being beaten while shouting “Falun Dafa is good.” The person was dragged away. Other practitioners suspected that the person was Ms. Wang but they didn’t know where she was taken to. They haven’t seen her again since.

Related report:

Having Endured Nine Years of Incarceration and Torture, Heilongjiang Woman Faces Prison Time Again

Inmates Involved in the Persecution

Bai Ying: sentenced to 15 years for drugs traffickingZhang Yang: unknownYang Wenchang: sentenced to life imprisonment for murderLi Miao: sentenced to 5 years for economic crimeLiu Yang: sentenced to life imprisonment for drugs traffickingWang Shu: unknownHuang Xiaoxia: sentenced to life imprisonment for drug traffickingSun Jing: death sentence with reprieve for drugs traffickingGao Wentao: unknownWu Guiru: unknownLi Yuan: sentenced to 15 years for drug traffickingYuan Jingfang: sentenced to life imprisonment for fraudShao Xiuping: sentenced to life imprisonment for murderDong Xiaofeng: death sentence with reprieve for fraudXin Xiaolei: sentenced to 15 years for drug traffickingLiu Rong: sentenced to 15 years for drug traffickingKong Qingling: sentenced to life imprisonment

Related reports:

Heilongjiang Woman Sentenced to Seven Years for Her Faith

Elderly Mother and Daughter Serving Time for Practicing Falun Gong, Denied Family Visits

Having Endured Nine Years of Incarceration and Torture, Heilongjiang Woman Faces Prison Time Again

Six Heilongjiang Residents Sentenced to Prison for Practicing Falun Gong

Appeal Rejected, Heilongjiang Woman Taken to Prison to Serve a Seven-year Term for Her Faith