(Minghui.org) A 61-year-old woman in Jinxian County, Nanchang City, Jiangxi Province has been subjected to frequent arrests and incarcerated for a total of 5 years and 3 months since the Chinese Communist Party ordered the persecution of her faith, Falun Dafa, in July 1999.
Ms. Wan Taoying was put in Jiangxi Province Women’s Forced Labor Camp in 2009 for 18 months, and nearly lost her vision due to the torture she experienced there. While serving another three-year term in Jiangxi Province Women’s Prison in 2014, her thumbs were fractured, and her mother passed away without seeing her for the last time. A few years after her release, Ms. Wan was arrested and jailed for 9 months. The authorities continue to harass and intimidate her after her release in 2022.
Ms. Wan Taoying
Chronic Illnesses Disappear Because of Falun Dafa
Ms. Wan raised two sons alone after her divorce. She used to run a fish farm and a stone processing plant. In her early 40s, she began to suffer constant fever and headache, and became sensitive to light. She spent a lot of time and money seeking treatments but her condition worsened and she became bedridden. She planned to travel overseas to seek better treatments in 2007.
Before Ms. Wan left China, she was introduced to Falun Dafa. She read the teachings and did the exercises. In less than a week, she felt better. Before she took up the practice she could not sit up for more than 20 minutes before she became exhausted. Now she was able to sit up all day reading. Gradually, all her illnesses disappeared. Her moral compass improved as she followed Falun Dafa’s principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance.
Torture in Forced Labor Camp Nearly Destroys Her Eyesight
Ms. Wan handed out a flier with information regarding the persecution of Falun Dafa to an elementary school student on March 24, 2009. She was reported to the police and subsequently arrested and given 18 months of forced labor.
Inside the Jiangxi Province Women’s Forced Labor Camp, Ms. Wan was forced to sit motionless on a small stool from early in the morning to 9 p.m. every day for six months. Because of the coarse surface of the stool, and sitting for so long, she developed infected sores on her buttocks after a few days. Her flesh stuck to her pants when she sat and was pulled away from her pants when she stood up. The blood ran down her legs and stained her pants. The guards intensified her misery by not letting her shower in the summer. In the winter, she could only shower with cold water.
Torture reenactment: Sitting still on a small stool
Forty-seven inmates were assigned to take shifts to watch Ms. Wan during her time in the labor camp. Because she refused to renounce Falun Dafa, the guards constantly put her in solitary confinement, where she ate, sleep and relieved herself in a tiny space. The food given to her was leftovers, which were sometimes rancid. She always tasted something strange in the breakfast given to her, and suspected that there were unknown drugs mixed in it.
The guards would not let Ms. Wan purchase daily necessities, including sanitary napkins. She had to do labor intensive work every day. One time she passed out while working and, to make her finish her daily quota, a guard made her work after hours from 9 p.m. to midnight that day while other inmates went back to their cells to rest.
The physical torture, unsanitary living conditions, and malnutrition caused Ms. Wan to nearly go blind. She could not raise her arms, her legs were too weak to support her without shaking, and she often fainted. She also suffered severe skin allergies and intense itchiness.
Mother Passes Away and Thumbs Broken Due to Torture While Imprisoned
Ms. Wan was arrested by officers from the Jinxian County Domestic Security Office while visiting a friend on April 15, 2013. The officers twisted her arms and dragged her downstairs. Prior to this arrest, she’d helped three practitioners hire lawyers to defend them in their trials.
Ms. Wan spent over a year in the Jinxian County Detention Center. The torture and inhuman treatment caused her to have systemic edema and severe stomach bleeding. She was rushed to a doctor in the detention center on April 23, 2014. The doctor insulted her and, when she passed out, accused her of faking her condition.
Xu Qing, the presiding judge of the Jinxian County Court delivered Ms. Wan’s indictment to her in the detention center on May 23, 2014. The judge scheduled a hearing of Ms. Wan’s case on July 1, but she refused to attend because the court didn’t inform her lawyer about it.
When Ms. Wan’s lawyer visited her at the detention center on July 8, he told her that he had come to visit her on June 30, but was refused entry by the guard. Upon seeing that the authorities had tried everything to block her lawyer from representing her, Ms. Wan was forced to dismiss the lawyer.
Two days later on July 10, the court scheduled another hearing for Ms. Wan. She still refused to attend, as the court didn’t inform her of the session three days ahead of time as required by law and she had yet to find a new lawyer to represent her.
At noon on July 15, Ms. Wan was deceived into going to a room in the detention center, only to find out that the court was having a hearing of her case there. The judge sentenced her to three years ten days later. In the verdict, it was stated that her “crime” was delivering a flash drive to a practitioner in April 2010. However at the time, she was still incarcerated in the Jiangxi Province Women’s Forced Labor Camp.
Ms. Wan appealed with the Nanchang City Intermediate Court, and protested that the lower court denied her legal representation. The intermediate court upheld the original sentence on September 30, 2014.
Ms. Wan’s elderly parents visited her in the detention center on October 8, hours before her transfer to Jiangxi Province Women’s Prison. Three days later her mother passed away in distress from missing her daughter.
The day Ms. Wan arrived at the prison, she was forced to stand still until midnight. The prison intensified the persecution of Falun Dafa practitioners in November and she was forced to watch brainwashing videos slandering Falun Dafa. One time she sang a song that praised Falun Dafa and was hung up by her wrists for 12 hours.
Torture illustration: The hang-up torture
The guards put Ms. Wan in solitary confinement and used the Tiger Bench to torture her. There were spring clamps underneath the bench and the guards used them to break her thumbs. She heard the snapping sound of her bones cracking. Still she refused to renounce her faith despite the excruciating pain, and the guards took her back to her cell and subjected her to the hang-up torture again.
A collaborator in the prison tied Ms. Wan’s hands up in December 2015 and she was unable to eat or use the bathroom. At night she was put in solitary confinement and slept on the freezing concrete ground with her hands tied.
Stomach Hemorrhage After Torture during Second Prison Term
Ms. Wan moved to Fuzhou City, Fujian Province to stay with her son and help care for her grandson. During the “Zero-out” harassment campaign in late 2021, she was forced to come back to Jinxian County, as her local authorities attempted to force her to renounce her faith.
Ms. Wan happened to be at practitioner Ms. Zou Liumei’s home on November 15, 2021 when the police came to harass Ms. Zou.
Ms. Wan brought Falun Dafa truth-clarification literature to the Minhe Police Station on November 26, 2021, urging the officers not to participate in the persecution. The police arrested her, ransacked her home and confiscated all her Falun Dafa books and relevant materials. She was held in the Nanchang City Detention Center for 15 days for “disturbing social stability.”
To protest the arbitrary arrest, Ms. Wan went on a hunger strike during her detention. As a result, she suffered stomach hemorrhaging. She was transferred to the Jinxian County Detention Center on December 10. She received her indictment on July 18 and was tried by the Xihu District Court on August 23, 2022. Her lawyer entered a not guilty plead for her and she also testified in her own defense. The court sentenced Ms. Wan to nine months in prison on August 24 with a 5,000-yuan fine. She was released the next day on August 25, having already served her term.
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Category: Torture of Women
