(Minghui.org) A 54-year-old woman was sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined 2,000 yuan for practicing Falun Gong after being detained for almost a year.

Ms. Zhou Guizhen was sentenced on March 9, 2017, by the Erqi District Court in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province. She was arrested while visiting another Falun Gong practitioner on April 10, 2016, and had been detained at Zhengzhou No. 3 Detention Center since.

Ms. Zhou's first trial hearing was held on September 28, 2016. Her lawyer from Beijing entered a not-guilty plea and presented a strong argument on why practicing Falun Gong does not violate any law. After listening to the lawyer's argument, the prosecutor submitted a statement to the judge recommending leniency.

During Ms. Zhou's second hearing on November 24, her daughter made an emotional statement to the court as she described how she and her sister were expelled from schools in fourth and seventh grades respectively because of her mother's spiritual belief.

Ms. Zhou has been repeatedly persecuted for practicing Falun Gong since the Chinese Communist regime banned the practice in 1999. She was arrested and detained by police for appealing for the right to practice Falun Gong in Beijing in 2001.

She was detained and sent to a brainwashing center in 2003, and later sentenced to Shibalihe Forced Labor Camp for one year. During her incarceration, she was subjected to severe torture, including being scalded by hot water, shocked with electric batons, and put into a strait jacket that nearly disabled her arms.