(Minghui.org) A 61-year-old retired teacher in Taikang County, Henan Province, was taken back into custody in August 2024 to serve three years for her faith in Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.
Ms. Sun Airong was arrested on December 9, 2022, after she was reported when she visited another Falun Gong practitioner. The arresting officers from the Nanguan Police Station submitted her case to Taikang County Procuratorate, which later returned the case citing insufficient evidence. The police then submitted her case to the Huaiyang County Procuratorate, which proceeded to indict her.
The Huaiyang County Court tried Ms. Sun in August 2023 and soon sentenced her to three years, with her term commencing on November 1, 2023. During the physical examination required for imprisonment, she was found to have a systolic blood pressure of over 200 mmHg (when a normal range is 120 or lower) and unfit for detention.
The court released Ms. Sun under house arrest and tasked the Nanguan Police Station with monitoring her. The police kept harassing her at home to see when she might have gotten well enough to be put in prison. They took her back into custody in August 2024 and have held her at the Huaiyang District Detention Center since. Her pension was also suspended after her wrongful conviction.
This is not the first time that Ms. Sun has been targeted for her faith, which she credits for freeing her from her numerous diseases, including pharyngitis, esophagitis, gastric disease, psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis, a herniated disc, and gynecological diseases. She filed a criminal complaint in 2015 against Jiang Zemin, the former Chinese dictator who ordered the persecution. In late October of that year, an officer from the Nanjiao Township Police Station deceived her into going to the police station by saying that there was something wrong with her ID number in the system. She went there and was arrested on the spot. The police attempted to hold her at a local lockup but she was denied admission after her five systolic blood pressure readings all registered at 190 mmHg, which can be life-threatening. She was then released.