(Minghui.org) A 55-year-old woman in Yangquan City, Shanxi Province stood trial on September 27, 2023 for her faith in Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.
Ms. Zhang Ruiping’s lawyer from Beijing defended her innocence and said, “My client is a law-abiding citizen who broke no law whatsoever by following Falun Gong’s principles to be a good person. She should be acquitted and released immediately.”
Ms. Zhang shared how Falun Gong enabled her to live an illness-free life. She suffered from stomach problems, enteritis (inflammation of her small intestine), and pain in her armpits and groin for years and no treatment helped. But all her symptoms disappeared after she took up Falun Gong in April 1999. Her bad temper improved, and she was able to get along with her mother-in-law. After the persecution of Falun Gong began in July 1999, however, she became a target for upholding her faith.
Ms. Zhang was most recently arrested on April 19, 2023. Her child had just opened the door that morning to go to work when captain Wu Guoguang and a few other officers from the Cheng District Domestic Security Office, who had been waiting outside, broke in.
Ms. Zhang was first taken to the Yangquan City Brainwashing Center and transferred to the Yangquan City Detention Center on May 5. She was issued a formal arrest warrant on May 19 and indicted in mid-August.
The Pingding County Court in Yangquan City held a hearing of Ms. Zhang’s case on September 27. The prosecutor charged her with “using a cult organization to undermine law enforcement,” a standard pretext used to frame and imprison Falun Gong practitioners.
Ms. Zhang’s lawyer refuted the allegation against her and emphasized that no enacted law in China criminalizes Falun Gong or labels it as a cult.
The prosecution evidence included 2,000 yuan of banknotes confiscated from Ms. Zhang’s home and a laminating machine that someone claimed to have seen Ms. Zhang use to laminate informational materials about Falun Gong.
The banknotes had Falun Gong messages printed on them as a way to raise awareness of the persecution of Falun Gong, and in no way broke any law or caused any harm to anyone. Ms. Zhang and her lawyer challenged the prosecutor to present the banknotes in court for everyone to see what messages printed on them had harmful content. The prosecutor rejected the request. His “witness” and the “laminating machine” were nowhere to be seen in court either, when normally the actual items of the prosecution evidence should have been presented during trial.
The hearing lasted a bit over one hour, with more than ten of Ms. Zhang’s family and friends in attendance.
Related report:
Exposing the Crimes Committed in Yangquan City Brainwashing Center
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