(Minghui.org) Ms. Pan Yanjun, 50, from Nong’an County, Jilin Province was tried on July 13, 2023 for practicing Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) since July 1999.
Ms. Pan Yanjun
A group of officers from the Qingshan Township Police Station in Nong’an County raided Ms. Pan Yanjun’s childhood home in Nantaizi Village on March 2, 2023. They then proceeded to raid her residence in Nong’an County and arrested her. The next day they took her to the Nong’an County Detention Center, where she remains.
Police chief Liu Xiaolin led the arrest and submitted her case to the Nong’an County Procuratorate, which then forwarded it to the Dehui City Procuratorate.
Ms. Pan’s family hired a lawyer from Beijing to represent her. The Nong’an County Police Department and the Nong’an County Procuratorate, however, used various excuses to not allow the lawyer to meet with his client or review her case documents (which at the time were still with the county procuratorate). The lawyer dropped the case.
The second lawyer Ms. Pan’s family hired was able to review her case documents, but only after they were submitted to the Dehui City Court. He was not allowed to visit her at the detention center. The center director listed more than twelve conditions that the lawyer must meet before being approved for visitation, even though by law defense attorneys are entitled to visit their clients in detention without any prerequisites.
Unable to review her case documents, Ms. Pan’s lawyer was effectively deprived of his right to defend her to the best of his ability.
Judge Jia Xiaoqiu heard Ms. Pan’s case at the Dehui City Court on July 13, 2023. No family member was allowed to attend the trial.
Prosecutor Yu Xianhe accused Ms. Pan of violating Article 300 of the Criminal Law, which states that anyone using a “cult” organization to undermine law enforcement must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Yu, however, also cited as legal basis Article 22 of the Criminal Law, which states that a suspect who merely prepares instruments or creates conditions for a crime may, when compared with one who actually completes the crime, be given a lighter punishment or even exempted from punishment.
Ms. Pan’s lawyer refuted this, and said that no enacted law has ever criminalized Falun Gong or labeled it as a cult. Moreover, Ms. Pan’s practice of Falun Gong did not harm anyone or society at large, much less undermine law enforcement. Therefore, Article 300 of the Criminal Law did not apply to Ms. Pan’s case.
The lawyer said that Yu’s reference to Article 22 of the Criminal Law indicated that he had no evidence whatsoever to charge Ms. Pan with committing any crime under Article 300, so he resorted to a lesser offense in “preparation for a crime” mentioned in Article 22, which in theory precludes the use of Article 300 in the same case.
Such conflicting statements regarding applicable laws were likely a result of the pressure from higher authorities to criminalize Falun Gong practitioners, who break no law by exercising their constitutional right to freedom of belief.
Yu recommended a heavy sentence of 3-7 years against Ms. Pan. Judge Jia said he would issue a ruling at a later date.
Past Persecution
Ms. Pan and her husband Mr. Jiang Shujun, who also practices Falun Gong, have been repeatedly targeted for their faith during the past 24 years of persecution.
For several nights in a row in November 1999, Sun Youtian, the security director of Nantaizi Village, led people to knock on the couple’s door around 10 p.m., asking if they were home. Their children and parents, who lived with them, were terrified.
In the spring of 2000, officers Sun Degui and Liu Xiaolin from the Qingshan Township Police Station gathered all local Falun Gong practitioners in the Nantaizi Village Office. The police took two one-inch photos of each practitioner and charged them each 50 yuan for the photos. The practitioners were also forced to give their fingerprints.
The police next set up a “criminal file” for each practitioner using their photos. Security director Sun Youtian then confiscated Ms. Pan’s and Mr. Jiang’s ID cards and did not return them for five years.
The couple struggled to live a normal life without ID cards. They could not work out of town, take out a loan, or do many mundane things.
In July 2000, Nantaizi village official Wu Kun and accountant Yu Zhanguo harassed Ms. Pan and Mr. Jiang at home, threatening to have them arrested if they refused to sign statements to renounce Falun Gong. Mr. Jiang’s father signed the statements for the couple.
In the summer of 2001, officers Qian Cunxiang, Sun Degui, Liu Xiaolin, and Lou Dongzi from the Qingshan Township Police Station raided the couple’s home.
On the morning of July 5, 2017, the Qingshan Township Police Station officers broke into the couple’s home and arrested Ms. Pan. They held her at the Nong’an County Detention Center for ten days. They said the reason was because she filed a criminal complaint against former CCP head Jiang Zemin for initiating the persecution of Falun Gong.
Around 8:00 a.m. on April 24, 2020, five officers from the Qingshan Township Police Station broke into Ms. Pan’s home and arrested her. They interrogated her at their police station and forced her to sign the interrogation records, list of confiscated items, search warrants, and notice of ten-day detention. However, they released her at 2:30 p.m. that afternoon without enforcing the ten-day detention.
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