(Minghui.org) A husband and wife in Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province, were recently sentenced to prison for their shared faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Mr. Yang Bin was sentenced to one year and Ms. Hu Xuefei to three years. Details about their indictment, trial, and sentencing aren’t clear. The couple’s daughter, who had depended on them to pay for her to study at a college outside of China, is struggling to put herself through school.

Ms. Hu’s ailing mother, in her 80s, was so distraught over her arrest that she passed away shortly after.

Ms. Hu and Mr. Yang were arrested by Xinhua Police Station officers on May 11, 2023. The police raided their home and a storage site, confiscating their printer and many other personal items. They were admitted to the Chaoyang City Detention Center that same day.

At 1 a.m. on May 12, hours after Ms. Hu’s arrest, she managed to call her family and ask them to help care for her elderly parents, especially her mother who was in the hospital. She also asked her family to contact her daughter and tell the young woman that she would have to figure out how to pay her tuition and living expense on her own.

Ms. Hu’s arrest devastated her mother, whose condition quickly deteriorated. Ms. Hu wasn’t allowed to see her mother for the last time or attend her funeral.