(Minghui.org) Mr. Zhang Guohai’s four-year prison term for practicing Falun Gong ended on July 27, 2023, but the Jiamusi City, Heilongjiang Province, resident was not allowed to go home freely.
He was met at the prison gate by an agent from the Qianjin District Political and Legal Affairs Committee in Jiamusi City, and two people from his local street committee. They took him to the Zhongshan Police Station and ordered him to give them a copy of his prison release certificate. The street committee people promised to give him a low-income subsidy if he sent in an application.
Having endured four years of abuse in prison, Mr. Zhang, 52, often felt pain in his stomach and spleen. He was always fatigued and doubted if he had the strength to look for a job. He thus went to the street committee to submit his low-income subsidy application. The director denied him on the spot because he was a Falun Gong practitioner.
The director later brought two people to Mr. Zhang’s place, an attic in a rundown building, and demanded to know his phone number. Only then did he realize that the low-income subsidy promise was just a ruse to try to get his contact information. He refused to reveal his information, but they managed to find it on their own. One of the people monitoring him later called him and asked about his address. He replied that he was still living in that attic.
Mr. Zhang once had a decent job at the Jiamusi Railway Bureau. He took up Falun Gong in 1996 and soon recovered from neurasthenia. After the Chinese Communist Party launched a nationwide campaign against Falun Gong in July 1999, he was repeatedly targeted for upholding his faith. He was given two forced labor terms, in 2002, and 2004, respectively. His wife was unable to cope with the stress of the persecution and divorced him in 2004, while he was serving the second labor camp term. After another arrest on July 27, 2019, Mr. Zhang was sentenced to four years in prison. Besides the three long-term detentions, he was also arrested at on at least four other occasions and was terminated from his job.
Minghui.org previously reported on Mr. Zhang’s earlier persecution and his latest prison sentence. Below is additional information that he revealed after he was released from prison.
Mr. Zhang was going up the stairs to his top-floor apartment unit on July 27, 2019, when he noted an older plainclothes officer behind him. As soon as he opened the door, a group of uniformed officers swarmed him. He learned later that instructor Zhao Bo from the Zhongshan Police Station led the arrest.
The police confiscated over 80 Falun Gong books, two images of the Falun emblem, a portrait of Falun Gong’s founder, Mr. Zhang’s bankcard, cell phone, a music player, and a laptop. They police later returned to raid the home a second time, seizing his kitchen appliances, tea pots, tea, clothes, silk comforter, and motorcycle.
Mr. Zhang was interrogated at the Qianjin District Police Department. At around 3 o’clock the next morning, he was taken to the Heitong Detention Center. He was held in a cell with the head inmate convicted of internet fraud. The head inmate kicked and punched Mr. Zhang upon his admission.
A few days later, Mr. Zhang was moved to another cell. Once, a guard on duty dragged him to the guards’ office and whipped him with a stick.
There was only one communal bed in the cell for all the inmates, but it was not big enough to accommodate everyone. Four people were always left out. The inmates thus waited in two-hour shifts to use the bed. Mr. Zhang said that he was also made to wait for two hours before it was his turn to sleep.
The lack of sleep, plus the mental pressure took a toll on Mr. Zhang’s health. A boil the size of a steamed bun grew on his left knee cap. The detention center doctor made an incision on his knee, without using anesthesia, to drain a large amount of pus. He was given IV injections for three days, during which time the police took him out of the detention center for interrogation.
A judge came to the detention center with a clerk, a court-appointed lawyer, and several police officers one afternoon in April 2021 to try Mr. Zhang.
The judge promised to give him a lighter sentence if he wrote a statement to renounce Falun Gong. Mr. Zhang refused and was sentenced to four years in prison.
The verdict was dated April 31, 2021. When Mr. Zhang pointed out that April does not have 31 days, the court clerk took back the verdict and put in a random date.
Mr. Zhang was admitted to the Shuangyashan Prison (formerly known as Bijiashan Prison) on May 10, 2021, for intensive training in preparation for transfer to another prison. The guards searched his clothes and ordered him to answer roll call while squatting. They also made him sit motionless for long hours every day.
The intensive training normally lasted for three months, but due to the COVID-19, it was shortened to less than one month. On June 3, 2021, Mr. Zhang was transferred to the Tailai Prison, which is located in Qiqihar City in Heilongjiang Province, over 400 miles away from Jiamusi City. Usually, inmates are placed in prisons close to their homes for ease of family visits, but the authorities intentionally sent Falun Gong practitioners far away from home to make family visits difficult.
The guards at the Tailai Prison tossed away all of the clothes Mr. Zhang brought in, as well as his verdict, leaving him with no changes of clothes.
Head inmate Wang Dongzhong had over 20 other inmates line up and block the surveillance cameras. He then beat Mr. Zhang and punched him in the chest. He also attempted, unsuccessfully, to make Mr. Zhang write a statement to renounce Falun Gong.
The guards later had Mr. Zhang recite the prison rules and do hard labor from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Saturday. He mostly made bags used to line shipping containers.
Once, Mr. Zhang did not finish his assigned work quota. A guard summoned him to an office and pepper-sprayed him, causing excruciating pain to his eyes. His eyes and nose ran uncontrollably, but the guard kept pepper-spraying him in an attempt to force him to write statements renouncing Falun Gong. Mr. Zhang still refused. The guard eventually stopped and allowed him to wash his eyes and face.
A few months later, an inmate reported Mr. Zhang for talking to him about Falun Gong. Guard Chen again pepper-sprayed him and shocked him on the chest with an electric baton.
The torture pushed Mr. Zhang to the limit. He became mentally disoriented and, against his will, wrote the required statements to renounce Falun Gong. From that point on, the persecution towards him appeared to lessen a bit and he was given a lighter workload.
While in prison, Mr. Zhang received a notice from the Jiamusi City Court stating that he was required to pay a court fine of 15,000 yuan. The police soon garnished all of the money (a bit over 10,000 yuan) in his bank account and turned it over to the court. After he had lost his job, Mr. Zhang ran deliveries to make ends meet. That was his only savings.
Mr. Zhang was released on July 27, 2023, only to face constant harassment and surveillance.
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