(Clearwisdom.net) Shortly before October 1, 2004, police illegally arrested several practitioners who were clarifying the truth. We were not intimidated by the adversity and instead fused into one body. We employed legal means twice to expose the evil and rescue fellow practitioners. We suppressed the evil, clarified the truth and helped people who have predestined relationship with Dafa in the judiciary. In the process, lawyers and the families of the imprisoned practitioners learned the truth, which encouraged those practitioners. The outcome was very positive.

We were initially anxious when the practitioners were first arrested. Through Fa study, however, we realized that we shouldn't be afraid or meek. Although at first we did not embark on a well-coordinated rescue activity, many practitioners devoted more of their efforts into clarifying the truth on a large scale. Some practitioners were go-betweens for the lawyers and the practitioners' families, despite the difficult circumstances. They clarified the truth as they pushed for the rescue. They wrote letters of petition, in which they exposed the crimes of the persecution committed against practitioners by agents from the local 610 Office, the National Security Division, and the police department. They sent these letters to the district Procuratorate, the district People's Congress, certain lawyers' associations affiliated with the district Party Committee, and the city Procuratorate. The despicable crimes of the perpetrators were exposed, and the truth about Dafa spread widely. This action shocked the local Communist regime agents. The head of the 610 Office ordered officers from the National Security Division and from the police department to make threats at the plaintiffs' homes. They also tried to get information from the plaintiffs. Dafa practitioners used this opportunity to clarify the truth to them and asked them to stop the persecution. They also eliminated the evil with righteous thoughts.

As more practitioners stepped forward to validate Dafa in various ways, and the powerful cooperation of Dafa practitioners as a united body was taking form, the police did arrest several practitioners during a small Fa conference at Christmas of 2004. Practitioners immediately looked inward for individual and group omissions. We realized that because things lately had gone smoothly, we took this lightly and overlooked safety measures. Complacency, the show-off mentality, and attachments to doing things and idolizing individual practitioners all surfaced. During sharing among practitioners, we were self-satisfied and praised each other. After the arrest, many of our attachments changed into fear. By then, many agents from the Communist regime were waiting outside the homes of practitioners.

After a brief period of anguish, practitioners did better in studying the Fa and sending forth righteous thoughts. We quickly did away with our fear and strengthened our righteous thoughts. We left home to clarify the truth and make efforts to rescue fellow practitioners. Some practitioners went to the heads of the police department with signed letters, and some practitioners in small groups went to the police department Appeals Office reception room. They protested the arrests and requested the imprisoned practitioners' release. Official vehicles followed practitioners closely right after they left their homes. Inside these vehicles labeled "city administration" sat a few officers from the National Security Division. We faced them with righteous thoughts.

Practitioners who learned about the arrest sent forth righteous thoughts to help incarcerated practitioners break free. Many of practitioner A's family members were Dafa practitioners. They went back and forth between the police department, the police station, the 610 Office and the Procuratorate, and inquired about the evidence upon which the arrests were based. These good people openly and assertively demanded the practitioners' release. The reply given to them was, "[The arrest] was based on sources from newspapers, TV stations and radio stations!" After they failed to support their claim under questioning from the practitioner's family, they gave the family the run-around. The deputy head of the police department in charge of receiving appellants said, "We didn't arrest him. Go to whoever arrested him!" The officers in charge of the case at the police department said, "Go to the National Security Division at the other police department." The Procuratorate said, "Go to the police department." The head of the police department said, "The 610 Office is charge of this type of affair. They should have the legal cause. Go to them!" The incarcerated practitioner clarified the truth with calmness and compassion wherever he went, including the detention center and the Beijing Police Hospital, and he saved sentient beings with compassion.

Twenty days or more after the arrest, while the practitioners were fully devoted to the rescue effort, the detention center authorities phoned the practitioner's family and said, "He had just been diagnosed with high blood pressure and coronary artery disease. We really want to release him, but the pre-interrogation office requires that you make up a statement saying that he was seriously ill when he was home," and emphasized, "You cannot bring recorders or video cameras!"

The practitioner's family was overwhelmed by the sudden turn of events, but they were eager to rescue him. They cooperated with the interrogation and signed documents, and also wrote the false statement that same day and gave it to the captors.

Later, during a practitioners' idea exchange one practitioner said, "That was wrong! We are trying to get his release at the cost of giving false testimony, yet what are we validating? Are we saying that a Dafa practitioner was critically ill while practicing Dafa at home? Is that validating Dafa? Also, if they really wanted to release him with good intentions, they could have released him right away based on the hospital exam results during the time he was held at the detention center. Why do they need a statement saying that he was sick at home? They want to shirk their responsibility, because when they have the family's statement, they cannot be blamed [for the practitioner's current condition]. This shows they don't really want to release him. Perhaps they still want to get some information from him. In all likelihood, now is the critical moment during the so-called 'assault the determined' period. Are we hurting him by doing this?"

The practitioner's family calmed down and looked inward. They realized their love for a family member couldn't become a trap during the rescue process. Our muddle-headedness and any slight impure and unrighteous thought could aggravate the persecution of our family members. Any compromise and cooperation with the evildoers from our side can void all of our previous rescue efforts. The practitioner remained incarcerated during the following days.

His family decided to make up for their mistake. They mustered the courage to go to the detention center and demand his release. They announced that their previous statement was void and asked for it back. As their righteous thoughts emerged, the practitioner was indeed released. This was remarkable, as during that time in that region, practitioners were quickly and arbitrarily sentenced, and it was highly unlikely that they would release a practitioner, much less one that they thought was an important one.

In January 2005, the district National Security Division officials arrested female practitioner B and charged her with "hiding propaganda materials at home." They took her to the Beijing Women's Forced Labor Camp. This practitioner has several family members who also practice Dafa. They immediately joined the rescue effort, along with other practitioners in the district who learned about the arrest. As they sent forth righteous thoughts on a more frequent basis, they mainly used legal channels and set themselves a higher goal: to help the judiciary in the Beijing area understand the illegality and irrationality of the persecution during the rescue process.

The practitioner's family initially went to the district police in charge of her persecution and demanded legal evidence to support the arrest. The police lied, and when they couldn't beat around the bush any longer, they gave the family the Decision of Labor Reeducation document. Their regulation was to give the original document to the person sentenced to forced labor. The document clearly states that the accused has the right to appeal. The practitioner's father and other practitioners requested an administrative review on behalf of practitioner B, but the review committee - the Beijing City Legal Administration Office - emphasized that the practitioner must obtain permission for representation. The guards at the Beijing Women's Forced Labor Camp created difficulties and even threatened the practitioners when they went to the labor camp to obtain permission from practitioner B. The practitioners remained unmoved and insisted on an administrative review. They encouraged and eventually convinced practitioner B to write a statement authorizing power of attorney, although practitioner B had gone astray and had succumbed to the labor camp's brainwashing.

The application for review exposed several things. The fabricated "oral affidavit," "witnesses and their testimonies," non-existent evidence and false charges against practitioner B. It also stated well-grounded reasons why certain laws and regulations were misused. Further included in the application were signed letters by some practitioners who had previously been sent to forced labor, who exposed the excessive heavy labor, barbaric mental torment and physical torture, terrible hygiene and food, and high-pressure brainwashing used at the labor camp. They additionally pointed out that it's impossible to write appeals statements from inside the labor camp, which makes the "right to appeal" in the Decision a lie. The application and truth clarification letters were hand-copied and sent to the State Council and the National People's Congress.

Repeated inquiries from practitioner B's representatives elicited this reply, "We'll let you know when the result comes out." When the legal deadline was reached, however, they made a decision to uphold the original decision, and sent the result to practitioner B. Several days later, when the representatives inquired again, the Review Committee answered, "[The decision] had been sent to the appellant herself." The Review Decision also stated, "[The appellant] has the right to file an administrative appeal with the court within a certain time period," the same language as in the Decision of Labor Reeducation. Practitioner B's family and other practitioners represented her and considered the actual situation in the judiciary. They wanted to do things right the first time and not waste time on repeated efforts. They avoided a long-term battle with the judiciary and didn't appeal again. They filed a lawsuit, made many copies of the lawsuit and distributed it to many officials in the upper judiciary in order to help them learn the truth.

As practitioners studied the case, studied related laws and wrote the lawsuit they found a huge gap: the two State Council Labor Reeducation Laws and Regulations that the police department and the administrative agency used as legal basis for sentencing Dafa practitioners to forced labor are in violation of existing laws, and particularly the Law of the People's Republic of China on Administrative Penalty. Labor reeducation is a penalty used by the highest administrative organ and it is outside the law. The practitioners called the forced labor to be given on a "wrong and inappropriate legal basis," because the Review Decision declared a "correct and appropriate legal basis" [about the original decision]. The practitioners pointed out the illegality of what the labor camp officials did.

The lawsuit pointed out that the two "labor reeducation laws and regulations" do not have a legal basis and should be repealed. They requested the court to abide by the law and send the plaintiff's case to be discussed by the State Council and the National People's Congress. This lawsuit also sharply pointed out the insidious nature of the labor reeducation system in China:

First, it targets people's thoughts rather than their actions. It deprives an entire society of people their freedom to think and believe, which stifles and suffocates that society.

Second, it allows the police to steer free of monitoring and restraint from the judicial, legal and court system and empowers them to enact long-term deprivation of personal freedom without permitting the victim to defend himself in court. It is a product of the highest administrative organs and above the law.

The second major point of the lawsuit was that the charges do not stand. Similar to many other illegally arrested Falun Gong practitioners, the plaintiff was charged with "resisting (disrupting) the administration of state law." This charge is not based on facts, and the so-called "state law" cannot be provided upon request. Up until today, not a single law says that it is a crime to practice Falun Gong! There is no legal, judicial process that has determined Falun Gong to be illegal, as based on facts and the law. The lawsuit additionally pointed out the illegality of two announcements made by Jiang Zemin and China's state-run media, and how the interpretation of Jiang's announcements by the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate do not apply to Falun Gong.

The third topic of the lawsuit was that the arrest process was illegal. We naturally clarified many aspects of the truth in explaining the illegitimacy of the police's handling of the case, including the crimes of the local police and the labor camp authorities.

We pointed out the absurdity and inhumanity of the whole persecution. The end of the lawsuit states: the plaintiff did not violate the law. The labor camp did not have approval of the public Procuratorate and doled out punishment without judicial defense. The labor camp has no right to deprive the plaintiff of her personal freedom for two years, which is in fact punishment itself. The plaintiff did not violate the Administrative Penalty Law. Moreover, the Administrative Penalty Law stipulates the length of time during which one's personal freedom is restricted, or administrative detention, should not exceed 15 days. Therefore, the defendant's administrative action does not have any legal basis and violates the legal process. The legal basis the court listed should not be acknowledged. We also requested that [the court] immediately correct and make up for its unlawful administrative action and that the defendant be held legally responsible according to Article 55 of the Administrative Penalty Law which states:

"If an administrative organ imposes an administrative penalty in any of the following manners, it shall be ordered by the administrative organ at the higher level or a relevant department to make corrections, and administrative sanctions may, in accordance with law, be imposed upon the persons who are directly in charge and other persons who are directly responsible for the offense:

We encountered lots of resistance in the process of filing the lawsuit. We were not attached to the outcome and simply did our best. This was a great opportunity to clarify the truth and expose the evil. We openly clarified the truth face-to-face to officials at state agencies and judicial departments. This was also a cultivation process, and we looked inward when obstacles arose.

Two days before the deadline to file the lawsuit, all of the documents were ready. Xuanwu District Court, which covers the defendant's jurisdiction, and the Beijing Labor Reeducation Administration Committee were three or four hours away. The first time we went, we spent a whole day there but were unsuccessful. The court clerk seemed to have already known about this case. She didn't reject the case outright, but purposefully nitpicked and wasted our time. She made some unreasonable demands and told us to make changes. Although she didn't make many changes, she ordered us to hand-copy the lawsuit onto A4 paper. The lawsuit has more than 5,000 words, and we had to turn it in the next day. It would be impossible, even if a person copied all night long. We decided not to hand-copy it and simply machine-copy it on A4 paper. We made slight changes to the beginning and conclusion.

We rushed to the court before closing the next day. The same clerk was angry because we didn't hand-copy the lawsuit. We sent forth righteous thoughts. She impatiently flipped through the lawsuit and couldn't find the paragraph she had problems with the day before. We carefully listened to her demands, which were that we are not entitled to ask for financial compensation until the next step and we cannot list the district police as the co-defendant because they have different administrative and political parameters. In fact, there is nothing wrong with asking for financial compensation, because the judge can deny the request during trial. The court clerk was only accepting the case and not handing out a verdict, so obviously this demand was unreasonable.

While studying related laws, we thought the district police dealt with the case, and the defendant approved the Decision for Labor Reeducation proposed by the police, so both the police and the defendant should be within the same administrative parameters, and that is why we listed both as defendants. But at this point we were not sure if our interpretation of the law was correct. We were at an impasse. In order to quickly file the case, we decided to make some compromises regarding the disagreements. We said, "That's easy. We'll cross out these lines right now." She said, "No, that would make the lawsuit look messy, you have to hand-copy the whole thing!" She was obviously picking fault, because we would miss the deadline if we did hand-copy it. We countered, "Then let us tell you about the lawsuit and file it that way!" We thought that because the court was about to close, she would not spend the time to listen to us explaining the case. Even if she did, we could still mail the lawsuit to the court, and the case handlers would see the detailed lawsuit.

She didn't expect us to say this and said without much confidence, "No, this case doesn't fit the criteria." We replied, "We don't have to list the district police as the defendant, but we have to keep all of the details about how they handled the case, and we will only remove our charges against them in the end." She nodded in agreement, and it was the end of the morning shift for her.

We had to stay there at noon and we calmed down to revise and copy the lawsuit. We also looked inward for shortcomings as we worked. Practitioner C realized that he was blindly optimistic and took lightly the evils' interference. He was too anxious about getting the lawsuit filed in the morning and didn't want to waste noontime at the office. After we ate and finished copying, we had to wait. Practitioner C sent forth righteous thoughts to eliminate the evil in the court. He felt that the anxiety was gone and he was clear-minded. Practitioner D said, "In the afternoon, they'll hassle us about the consignment procedure of the power of attorney." The Review Committee told him that the consignment procedure must be re-done for filing a lawsuit. We didn't have the time to do it. Fortunately, the original consignment paper says, "administrative lawsuit." Practitioner C said, "Don't think this way! Everything is the result of our intentions." Practitioner D immediately realized, "Exactly! We have great powers, and our single thought can bring about tremendous changes. How could I aid the evil with my thoughts, reinforce the evil's energy and let it persecute us?"

In the afternoon we went to the case handling division while sending forth righteous thoughts. A man and a woman were in the office. The young male clerk that we dealt with was different from the one who handled our case earlier that morning. He carefully read over the lawsuit and treated it like any other lawsuit. He accepted the documents for the Review Committee and gave us a fee slip. He said, "Just put the fee stub here after you pay it." He went inside with the lawsuit. It went very smoothly. A while later, practitioner D brought the stub for the paid fee. He said, "We only have our contact address on the lawsuit. I want to wait for him to come out and give him our phone number." Practitioner C said, "Let's go." After we left the court, practitioner C said, "I'm a little afraid." "Are you afraid that he is going to change his mind?" Practitioner C said, "I'm just afraid a negative twist might come our way." No one probed more deeply about what he was afraid of.

We went home with light hearts and waited for the trial to begin. We phoned the court about four days later. The young male court clerk said, "The decision hasn't come out yet. You have to wait." On the sixth day the court clerk called us and said, "We received a notice saying that Falun Gong is a political issue and we cannot accept it. Come quickly and we'll refund your filing fee." We didn't see this coming, as the trial had not even started! Practitioner C thought, "Our bad thoughts create many adverse situations. Why do we always let poor human notions emerge? Our fear of the court clerk giving us the bad news shows we were attached to the outcome and were regarding this matter as ordinary people's affairs." The difference between man and gods is one thought! Why do we always waver between a god's way of thinking and human thoughts?

Since a problem had risen, we would follow Master's Fa principles and pay attention to the process, not being attached to the outcome. We would clarify the truth wherever there is a problem. We grasped this opportunity to clarify the truth and wrote an Objection on Filing the Lawsuit. We used deep and convincing reasoning from at least seven different viewpoints to discuss the "reason" why our lawsuit was not accepted. We ended the objection with the current persecution of the plaintiff in the labor camp and a request for the court to accept the case. We refuted the reason the court used to reject our case.

This objection greatly strengthened the lawsuit. Practitioners immediately gave the objection to the court clerk and asked him to read it and give it to court officials. He immediately took it and said, "It's also very hard for us." We believe that this well-intentioned young man will be the first one to benefit from our truth clarification.

Also, because the court refused to take our case, we mailed our objection along with the lawsuit to the State Council, the National People's Congress, the Supreme Procuratorate, the Supreme Court, the Intermediate Procuratorate, the Intermediate Court, the Arbitration Committee, and the Beijing Women's Labor Camp. Later we mailed the papers to the district Party Committee, the district government, the district People's Congress, the Politics Committee, the Judicial Bureau, the district Procuratorate, the district court, and the police department, among other places.

We went to talk to the deputy head of the Xuanwu Court in charge of administrative cases on his "open" day. We explained the situation and gave him a copy of the lawsuit and the objection. He took them and wrote down a practitioner's contact phone number. Later, we received a letter from the Judicial Bureau of the State Department, which told us to continue the judicial process and avoid the appeal. We also received a phone call from a government office saying, "It's not easy for this case to have progressed to this extent. Keep going and you don't need to appeal right now." We know that no matter what kinds of bad things a person has done in this life or in previous lives, he would be saved if he has righteous thoughts toward Dafa. We were truly happy for people who were sympathetic toward Dafa.

We phoned the Supreme Court and inquired about the rejection of our case. The official immediately said, "No, you have to go to Xuanwu Court!" When he learned that this was a case about Falun Gong, he suddenly became hesitant. Some practitioners went to the Xuanwu Court, and the court officials arranged for their reception. The officials said, "You know about the current system. If [the government] redresses the issue about Falun Gong and declares Falun Gong's innocent, we'll be the first to file your case!" The practitioners told him what the Judicial Bureau and the Supreme Court said and the official said, "Could you have the Supreme Court phone me and give me permission to accept this case?" The practitioner couldn't say anything more because the official was in a really difficult situation. Judicial independence and rule of law are empty words in China right now.

Our lawsuit is in limbo, but many people have learned the truth and the reasoning behind the lawsuit during the process. The incarcerated practitioner and her family members gained courage and became clear-minded. We disintegrated a large amount of evil through righteous thoughts and righteous actions, and we also alleviated persecution of an incarcerated fellow practitioner. During the process, we constantly discovered our human notions and eliminated them, because this is a part of cultivation.

Due to the limited number of practitioners who participated in this rescue effort and the fact that we didn't form a coordinated action, some practitioners accused the incarcerated practitioner of his attachments in order to cover up their own selfishness and fear. Some practitioners were indifferent because they felt it had nothing to do with them, so they didn't take part in the effort. These are omissions in our whole body. The outcome would have been better if some practitioners clarified the truth to the judicial bureau and other government agencies, while other practitioners sent forth righteous thoughts at home.