(Minghui.org) A woman in Benxi City, Liaoning Province, was admitted to the Liaoning Province Women’s Prison on June 18, 2026, to serve a four-year term given five years ago because she practices Falun Gong.
Ms. Yang Liwei, around 57, was initially arrested on May 23, 2019, while she distributed Falun Gong informational materials. She was tortured at the Benxi City Detention Center and suffered multiple organ failure. She was then released on bail. The Hengren County Court sentenced her to four years on September 4, 2020, after conducting a hearing at her home (as she was too weak to travel to the courthouse). Four other practitioners who were arrested at the same time as she were also convicted. One of them died in prison. See the related reports for details.
Ms. Yang appealed to the Benxi City Intermediate Court, which ruled against her on November 17, 2020. Due to her poor health, she was allowed to postpone serving time. She was extremely thin and weak, yet the Hengren County Court ordered her taken back into custody five years later. The police seized her on May 8, 2026, and put her in the Benxi City Detention Center. She was transferred to the Liaoning Province Women’s Prison on June 18 and assigned to the Twelfth Division, the strict management team designated to persecute Falun Gong practitioners. Her family worries whether she’d be able to survive the relentless torture there.
This isn’t the first time Ms. Yang has been targeted for her faith. She was sent to the notorious Masanjia Labor Camp in 2006, and served a term of unknown length. She was brutally tortured and almost died (see the last related report for details). Some of the commonly used torture methods there include beatings, pricking fingers with needles, being hung up naked, standing or squatting for long periods of time, solitary confinement, sleep deprivation, having boiling water over the person, not being allowed to use the restroom, not being given sanitary pads during their menstrual periods, and being under constant surveillance.
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Crimes Committed by Vicious Guard Ma Jishan at the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp (photo)