(Minghui.org) Eleven Beijing residents were sentenced to 2-8 years in prison on January 14, 2022, for their faith in Falun Gong, weeks before the 2022 Winter Olympics, set to be held in China from February 4 to 20. Two of the Falun Gong practitioners have been released after serving their two-year terms, and the remaining nine practitioners were transferred to various prisons in recent months. Most of them have been denied family visits because they held firm to their faith.
The eleven Falun Gong practitioners were arrested on July 19, 2020, by over 100 police officers, after they were suspected of submitting photos of the city during the pandemic lockdown to The Epoch Times, a U.S.-based media company.
The authorities approved the practitioners’ arrests on August 28. Their families were kept in the dark about their situation, and no formal detention notices were ever sent out.
The Dongcheng District Procuratorate indicted the practitioners and moved their cases to the Dongcheng District Court on April 2, 2021. Their defense lawyers were each given only four hours to review their case documents when the case rested with the procuratorate. After the case moved to the court, the lawyers were asked to all be present at the same time before they could review the documents. They were not allowed to carbon copy or photocopy the documents. Their requests to have electronic copies of the documents were denied.
The judge sentenced the practitioners to two to eight years in prison on January 14, 2022.
- Ms. Xu Na was sentenced to eight years with a 20,000 yuan fine.- Mr. Li Zongze, Mr. Li Lixin, Ms. Zheng Yujie, and Ms. Zheng Yanmei were each sentenced to five years with a 10,000-yuan fine.- Ms. Deng Jingjing, Mr. Zhang Renfei, Mr. Liu Qiang, and Ms. Meng Qingxia were each sentenced to four years with an 8,000-yuan fine.- Ms. Li Jiaxuan and Ms. Jiao Mengjiao were each sentenced to two years with a 4,000-yuan fine.
All eleven practitioners filed appeals with the Beijing City No. 2 Intermediate Court, which held a hearing on May 18, 2023. The practitioners had prepared to testify in their own defense but were never allowed to talk during the appeals hearing. The presiding judge simply announced to uphold their original verdicts.
Ms. Li Jiaxuan and Ms. Jiao have been released after serving their two-year terms. The other nine practitioners were held at the Dongcheng District Detention Center before being transferred to various prisons in recent months.
Mr. Li Zongze was transferred to the Shandong Province Prison in mid-September 2023 and has since been denied family visits.
Ms. Xu and Ms. Meng were first moved to the Tianhe Prison in mid-September 2023 before being transferred to the Beijing Women’s Prison in late September. Their families made numerous requests to visit them but were rejected each time.
Mr. Liu was transferred to the Beijing Men’s Prison around September 2023.
Ms. Zheng Yujie and Ms. Zheng Yanmei were transferred to the Henan Province Women’s Prison around August 2023 and both have been denied family visits.
Ms. Li Lixin, Ms. Deng, and Mr. Zhang were still held at the Tianhe Prison as of mid-September 2023 and it was said that they were to be transferred to the Hebei Province Prison soon. It is unclear whether the prison transfer has taken place at the time of writing.
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