(Minghui.org) I am 59 years old this year and was formerly an official on the Guangde County Board of Education. I started practicing Falun Gong in 1995, and I was sentenced to three years in prison on April 18, 2014, simply for upholding my faith.
I was subjected to intensive brainwashing sessions in Anhui Women's Prison, and tortured to the brink of death. I ultimately wrote a guarantee statement, desperate to get out of there alive. I regretted this, and later wrote a solemn declaration retracting the statement and declaring my resolve to uphold my practice.
I am writing an account of the abuse that I endured for three years in the prison, so as to expose the persecution.
Criminal Treatment
After the verdict was issued, I was sent to the prison and subjected to criminal treatment.
I was first instructed to remove all my clothes for the guards to perform a body search, to ensure that I did not bring in any Falun Dafa teachings. I was then taken to the cell and had my hair cut. I was also forced to wear a prison uniform and serial number.
The guards tried to instill in me that I was a criminal by lecturing me on the prison rules, including not being allowed to practice the exercises or talk to others about the practice.
I refused to cooperate with their demands, nor would I sing the prison songs. Because I did not participate in the forced labor, I was forced to stand facing the wall with restricted bathroom breaks. I was also not allowed to move or talk to others. When other inmates had ended work, I had to stand until midnight before I was allowed to sleep.
This long-term torture took a toll on my physical and mental health.
Intensive Brainwashing Session
Falun Gong practitioners were sent to different prisons and monitored closely. No one was allowed to talk to others, and all have to perform labor. Every practitioner has to submit “thought reports” to the guards.
Practitioners assigned to attend the brainwashing sessions have a designated guard that escorts the practitioner to the brainwashing facility and back.
Not long after I entered the prison, I was taken to a brainwashing session that included inmates from three other prisons.
The guards in the brainwashing facility are in charge of forcing practitioners to give up their faith. During the class, I was sworn at and forced to stand as punishment when I spoke out against their lies. The session lasted for one month. After it ended, one guard told me that they have never seen someone like me, who could not be “transformed.”
I was sent to a different brainwashing facility in August 2015, and it lasted six months. In an attempt to find my breaking point, the guards went to my hometown to talk to my relatives, friends, and former colleagues. However, everyone said that I had always been a good person.
A guard by the name of Wei Cai was responsible for “transforming” me. As nothing in the brainwashing session could break me, she tried treating me as a person with mental illness. She instructed me to complete 500 mental health test questions in one session. The result showed that my mental health was very good.
She then threatened that if I would not “transform,” the prison would be my permanent home and I would not be able to practice my faith.
Seeing that I still refused to write the guarantee statement, she grabbed my hand and started writing a few words while other guards pinned me down. I became bruised all over and my arm was swollen. I still refused to give in.
Abuse and Torture
I was then subjected to abuse and torture from the inmates and guards. The inmates were instigated by the guards to use various means to “transform” me in order to get their sentences reduced.
On my first night in the prison, the guards had the inmates take turns monitoring me around the clock. The inmates were angry and swore at me, as they were tired from working all day, and had to monitor me at night. I tried pleading with the guards to let the inmates off and was told to “transform” instead.
When I told the inmates that they should look for the guard who had instructed them to monitor me around clock, they replied, “The guards said that we don't have to work the night shift if you transform. We beg you to do it now.” I was saddened by this, but explained to them my reason for not giving up my belief.
Once, an inmate who had been instructed to monitor me for a long time became angry and threatened me, “You should know that there is no surveillance camera in this room. Do you understand what I'm saying?”
As I refused to be “transformed,” I was not allowed to buy any food. I resorted to drinking water instead. Drinking more water meant going to the toilet more often. As I had to be accompanied by an inmate everywhere I went, and the inmates had many tasks to complete, they complained to the guards that they did not have time to accompany me to the toilet. Hence, the guards restricted my toilet use to three times per day and I was also told to drink less water.
One day after breakfast, I was taken to the brainwashing center by guard Wei. She ordered me to stand and not lean against the table. During lunch, she pushed away my meal and forbade me from eating. The same thing happened during dinner.
I was hungry and started drinking more water. However, Wei forbade me from using the toilet and I was forced to stand until midnight. Wei instructed the prison guards not to give me any food.
This continued for four days. I became very weak and haggard, and the inmates began to feel bad for me. They no longer complained when they had to work the night shift to monitor me. They even gave me some of their food during breakfast and tried persuading me to give in, fearing for my life.
On the fifth day, I started to feel lightheaded and the left side of my face became numb. The guard allowed me to sit down. While I was resting, the guard observed me. She suddenly screamed for others to come over to determine if the left side of my face was redder than the right side.
When the others confirmed this, she insisted that I go to the prison hospital. I told her that I would be fine after resting. She did not believe it and was afraid that I might be in danger. She gave me a pen and paper, asking me to declare that she would not be held responsible if something happened to me.
The next day, guard Wei took me to the doctor to measure my blood pressure. My blood pressure was 140-175. She tried to force me to take medicine, but I refused. I explained that the high blood pressure was because I was not allowed to eat or sleep. I told her that if she allowed me to sleep at 9:00 p.m. that night and the blood pressure was still high the next day, I would take the medicine.
She agreed to this and asked me to write it down on a piece of paper. Although she allowed me to sleep at 9:00 p.m. that day, she continued to restrict me from using the toilet and forbade me from eating during the day.
My blood pressure became normal the next day and guard Wei did not believe it. The doctor suggested that we return the following day to take it again. My blood pressure continued to be normal.
On the eighth day, I felt terribly uncomfortable and my vision turned bad. I became desperate, not wanting to die in the prison. At night, I wrote a guarantee statement and gave it to guard Wei. She insisted that I write the word “criminal” in front of my name. I obliged.
After writing the statement, I felt deep regret, knowing that this was something a cultivator should not do.
I later wrote a solemn declaration to retract my words. Guard Wei was angry, but not surprised. They finally gave up on persecuting me.
