(Minghui.org) The family of Ms. Zhang Yuzhen in Yinchuan City, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, confirmed in early February 2025 that she had been admitted to the Ningxia Women’s Prison to serve a 1.5-year term for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1990.
Ms. Zhang was arrested on February 28, 2024, after someone who worked in a hair salon reported her for putting Falun Gong informational materials in the basket of a bike in front of the salon. The Xixia District Procuratorate approved her arrest on March 13 and indicted her on an unknown date.
Ms. Zhang appeared in the Xixia District Court on August 26, 2024, and was sentenced to 1.5 years with a 5,000-yuan fine on October 28, 2024. After she appealed with the Yinchuan City Intermediate Court, her lawyer and daughter (who served as her non-lawyer family defender) repeatedly requesed an open hearing of her case. The appeals judge denied their request and ordered them to submit their defense statement in writing instead. When the lawyer refused to submit the defense statement and insisted on having a hearing, the local justice bureau and his own law firm pressured him into complying with the judge’s order. Ms. Zhang’s daughter was also harassed and had to submit her defense statement.
In her own appeal letter, Ms. Zhang said that many of her ailments, including gallstones, stomach problems, and rheumatism, disappeared after she took up Falun Gong. She lives by the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance and strives to be a good person. She said that no law in China deems practicing Falun Gong and that she didn’t harm anyone or violate any law in practicing her faith. She demanded an acquittal.
Ms. Zhang’s lawyer pointed out in his defense statement that the prosecutor failed to provide any evidence to show how his client “undermined law enforcement with a cult organization,” the standard pretext used by the communist regime’s judicial system to sentence Falun Gong practitioners.
According to the lawyer, first of all, the prosecutor didn’t show evidence to prove Ms. Zhang’s alleged involvement in any cult organization (as a matter of fact, no law in China has ever designated Falun Gong as a cult). Second, there was no evidence to show how Ms. Zhang undermined law enforcement and caused harm to anyone or society at large. The lawyer urged the judge to uphold justice for Ms. Zhang and release her.
On February 7, 2025, Ms. Zhang’s daughter received the appeals court’s decision, issued on January 23, 2025, to uphold her mother’s original verdict. The verdict was signed by presiding judge Song Mingyi, judges Yang Lulu and Huang Qiong, and court clerk Li Huirong.
Ms. Zhang’s daughter also received a call from the Ningxia Women’s Prison days later that Ms. Zhang was admitted there on February 10 and assigned to division 5. When she asked to visit her mother and to make a cash deposit to her commissary account to buy daily necessities, the caller said that Ms. Zhang wouldn’t be allowed family visits or be allowed to buy daily necessities as long as she didn’t renounce Falun Gong. Her family is very worried about her.
Prior to her latest sentencing, Ms. Zhang was arrested on July 20, 2018, for raising awareness about the persecution. She was tried in the Xixia District Court on March 19, 2019, and sentenced to 15 months with a 3,000-yuan fine on May 23, 2019. She was released from the Yinchuan City Detention Center on October 20, 2019. She was arrested again on December 3, 2021, detained for ten days and fined 500 yuan.
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