Select Cases of Senior Falun Gong Practitioners Targeted for Their Faith
(Minghui.org) Since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) started to persecute Falun Gong in July 1999, countless practitioners of different ages, including those in their 80s and 90s, have been arrested, sentenced, and tortured for not renouncing their faith.
Below are some select persecution cases of senior practitioners.
Persecuted to Death
85-year-old Woman Died 20 Years Later After Son Was Persecuted to Death
Ms. Ren Canru, a retired teacher at Northwest Normal University’s affiliated elementary school in Lanzhou City, Gansu Province, passed away at the age of 85 on August 3, 2021, after being persecuted for more than 20 years.
Ms. Ren’s son, Mr. Yuan Jiang, worked at the Lanzhou Telecommunication Bureau after graduating from Tsinghua University. In 2001, he was tortured and persecuted to death at the age of 29 for not renouncing his faith.
Ms. Ren’s husband, professor Yuan Zhuguo, was the chair of the Physics Department at Northwest Normal University. Professor Yuan isolated himself from others after his son’s death. For years, he rarely spoke and often cried out loud when he was alone. Professor Yuan never recovered from grief and he passed away in January 2011.
Ms. Ren lived alone after her husband’s death, and she was often harassed by the police. On December 22, 2020, a dozen police officers used a chainsaw to break in and arrested her house aide. She was so frightened that she cried and shouted. Afterward, her health deteriorated and she could no longer take care of herself and passed away later.
Related report:A Mother Recounts a Young Man’s Tragic Death and Injustice Suffered for His Belief
81-year-old Woman Dies After Two Decades of Persecution for Her Faith
Ms. Zhang Chenghua worked for a local farm affiliated with a grain and oil production company in Mishan City, Heilongjiang Province. Due to years of hard labor, she developed severe ailments, including diabetes and inflammation of her lungs and kidneys. She spent a fortune on medical treatments, with minimal improvement. In deep despair, she took up Falun Gong in July 1999. While her health soon recovered, she was also devastated to see the communist regime ordering nationwide persecution in the same month.
Ms. Zhang was detained several times and given forced labor for not renouncing her faith. Li Li, the Party secretary of the farm, and police officer Xiao Zhizhong, who also headed the 610 Office in the police department, harassed Ms. Zhang again on April 25, 2000, and ordered her to renounce Falun Gong. She said that she had the freedom of belief to practice Falun Gong and follow it to be a good person. Li arrested her again and detained her for over two months.
On May 11, 2017, Ms. Zhang was walking on the street when she was arrested. She was sentenced to one year in prison and fined 10,000 yuan in 2018. The local social security office suspended her pension as of September 2020 and ordered her to return the funds she received during her one-year imprisonment. The 5% annual bonus from her workplace was also suspended. Ms. Zhang went to various government agencies to appeal the case, but to no avail. Her health kept declining. She passed away in early October 2021.
Man in His 80s Died After Suffering Nerve Damage from Violent Beating
Mr. Yang Shengchun, a retired government employee in his 80s, lived in Yawan Village, Xintian Town, Lintao County, Gansu Province. He was arrested twice and detained at a brainwashing center for two years for distributing Falun Gong materials.
In March 2007, while Mr. Yang was delivering Falun Gong informational materials to the neighboring Caojiahe Village, he was arrested by village officials. They knocked him to the ground and stomped on his head, causing him to lose consciousness. He suffered severe nerve damage that affected him mentally. On December 18, 2009, he was very confused and could not find his way home. The next day he was found near a ditch where he had frozen to death.
86-Year-Old Woman Suffers Stroke after Being Pushed Down by Police, Dies Three Years Later
Ms. Li Xiumiao of Fuyu City, Jilin Province, used to be a healthy person who could cook for her family and do the household chores. However, she died on April 30, 2019, after suffering a stroke that resulted from a fall.
In July 2016, several police officers went to Ms. Li’s house and took away her music player which she used to do the Falun Gong exercises. When Ms. Li tried to take it back, one officer pushed her down, and her head hit the edge of the Kang bed-stove.
When Ms. Li’s older daughter returned home that night, she saw her mother sitting on the Kang bed, bleeding from the back of her head, and incoherent. The doctors said that Ms. Li had suffered a stroke. She was paralyzed and unable to take care of herself thereafter.
In May 2018, Ms. Li’s daughter was arrested and sentenced to four years in prison for practicing Falun Gong. Less than a year later, Ms. Li died at age 86.
Mr. Luo Zhenggui was a retired government official from Shibao Town in Gulin County. He took up Falun Gong in April 1999. He credited the practice with curing his stomach cancer, as well as many other problems such as pneumonia, bronchitis, and nephritis.
After the persecution started, Mr. Luo and his wife were sentenced twice for not renouncing their faith. Mr. Luo had his pension suspended and his home confiscated.
Mr. Luo’s last arrest was on November 5, 2021, when he was on his way home after visiting a bank. The police smashed the lock on his rental apartment and raided the place. To avoid further persecution, he and his wife lived away from home.
When Mr. Luo’s health started to decline while on the run, they decided to return home. But shortly after that, he passed away on July 6, 2022.
Ms. Guo Zhenxiang, 82, was from Zhaoyuan City, Shandong Province. She was seized by officers from Mengzhi Police Station at a bus station in the early morning of January 11, 2019. At around 10 a.m., her family was summoned to the police station, where they were told that their loved one had died.
The police claimed that Ms. Guo became ill after being taken to the police station and died in a local hospital despite resuscitation attempts. Her body was then taken to Zhaoyuan City Funeral Home without her family’s consent.
Suspecting that she had been abused at the police station, Ms. Guo’s son hired two lawyers to investigate her death.
The lawyers requested to see surveillance videos recorded between Ms. Guo’s arrest and her death. The police only agreed to show the footage of her arrest and denied having recordings of her at the police station or her resuscitation in the hospital.
The lawyers examined Ms. Guo’s body at the funeral home. They found a large area of bruises on the back of her head. When they questioned the police about the bruises, the officers changed their narrative and said that she died after taking a fall.
As the lawyers were preparing to file complaints against the police for Ms. Guo’s death, the police used every means to stop them. They monitored and harassed the lawyers and Ms. Guo’s family.
The lawyers were also threatened with license revocation. They were thus forced to drop the case.
The police offered to settle the case with a small sum of money with Ms. Guo’s family, who rejected the settlement. Ms. Guo’s body remains at the funeral home.
Related report:Police Threaten Lawyers Into Dropping Investigation of Falun Gong Practitioner's Death in Custody
88-year-old Man Died After Police Ransacked His Home
Mr. Wang Hongxi, 88, of Qingdao City, Shandong Province, was in good health after practicing Falun Gong.
In the winter of 2016, Mr. Wang was distributing Falun Gong materials in the market when he was reported to the police and arrested. He was released after two hours, but the police ransacked his home and confiscated his Falun Gong books.
After losing the books and being scared from the arrest, Mr. Wang felt unwell and had no appetite. He passed away on February 4, 2017.
90-Year-Old Sichuan Man Dies Six Months after Arrest
Mr. Pan Guangxing, 90, of Wanyuan City, Sichuan Province, was reading Falun Gong books in his home on June 21, 2016, when the police broke in and arrested him.
The arrest attracted the attention of Mr. Pan’s neighbors, who informed his stepson. His stepson hurried home to stop the police. The police then ransacked Mr. Pan’s home and confiscated all his Falun Gong books and materials.
Unable to handle the harassment and threats, Mr. Pan developed high blood pressure and diabetes and was admitted to the hospital. Mr. Pan passed away six months later, on December 5.
Woman, 80, Dies After Police Threaten to Punish Her for Suing Former Chinese Dictator
Ms. Wu Qiu’e, a resident of Daxing’anling, Heilongjiang Province, became healthy after practicing Falun Gong in 1996.
Ms. Wu Qiu’e
Ms. Wu filed a lawsuit in July 2015, accusing Jiang Zemin, former head of the Chinese Communist Party, of initiating the persecution of Falun Gong, a meditation practice that restored her health and gave her a happy life. The police showed up at her home on October 28, 2015. They forcibly took her fingerprints and warned her of upcoming punishment. Ms. Wu passed out not long after the officers left. Her children rushed her to the hospital later that day after finding out about what happened. Despite resuscitation efforts, Ms. Wu passed away. She was 80.
86-year-old Man Dies Days Before Finishing Wrongful Prison Term for Practicing Falun Gong
Mr. Li Peigao from Kunming City, Yunnan Province died on January 4, 2023, days before he finished serving a four-year term for practicing Falun Gong. According to inmates who were released before him, Mr. Li had good health in the prison and it was shocking that he suddenly died, just days before he was to be released. He was 86.
Mr. Li Peigao retired from Yunnan Construction Installation Company as a senior engineer in 1994 and lived alone. After the persecution started, he was arrested, detained, fined, and sentenced several times for telling people about Falun Gong.
Mr. Li’s latest sentencing resulted from his arrest on November 26, 2015, together with two other practitioners. The Xishan District Court held a joint hearing of all three practitioners’ cases on September 8, 2016. Mr. Li recounted how his chronic diarrhea disappeared after practicing Falun Gong and that he tried to be a good person by following Falun Gong’s principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. The judge kept interrupting him and didn’t allow him to finish. He was sentenced to four years on October 8, 2016. Mr. Li appealed with the Kunming City Intermediate Court, which ruled to uphold his original verdict.
He was taken to the Yunnan Province Prison to serve time in January 2019 and denied family visitation since. He passed away a few days before he was to be released.
Practitioners in Their 80s Sentenced for Their Faith
83-year-old Woman Sentenced to One Year for Practicing Falun Gong
Ms. Li Shunhua, an 83-year-old woman in Maoming City, Guangdong Province, was sentenced to one year and fined 3,000 yuan on February 28, 2023.
Ms. Li took up Falun Gong in September 1995 and she credits the practice for curing her many ailments, including rheumatoid arthritis, tuberculosis, nephritis, sciatic nerve pain, and frozen shoulder.
In recent years, Ms. Li was harassed by the local 610 Office and police. They ordered her to renounce Falun Gong. She remained firm in her faith and told them how practicing Falun Gong benefitted her. However, she was arrested.
On March 6, 2023, Ms. Li’s lawyer was finally able to visit her at Maoming City No. 1 Detention Center and learned that Ms. Li suffered from frequent headaches and had blurred vision.
80-year-old Woman Jailed for Practicing Falun Gong
Ms. Lin Chunzi, an 80-year-old woman in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province, went out on February 10, 2023, to mail letters, but never returned home. Her family later learned that she has been taken to the Heilongjiang Province Women’s Prison to serve a four-year term.
Ms. Lin was previously sentenced to four years in prison in June 2021 but was allowed to serve time outside of prison due to her poor health. It’s not clear what prompted the authorities to take her into custody and whether they intended to have her finish the remainder of her prison term or reset the clock of the term.
Ms. Lin’s husband previously worked at Hailin Public Security Bureau. After his death, Ms. Lin lived on survivor’s benefits of several hundred yuan per month. The benefit was frozen in July 2022.
On February 10, 2023, Ms. Lin went to mail letters but did not return home. She was sent to prison without any formalities; her family was not notified.
Ms. Lin used to suffer from many ailments, including a heart condition, and stomach and liver conditions. Her symptoms disappeared one month after she learned Falun Gong in August 1997. As she persisted in her faith after the onset of the persecution, she has been repeatedly arrested and incarcerated.
While in police custody, Ms. Lin was restrained in a chair and handcuffed behind her back. An officer grabbed her hair and poured mustard oil into her nose. They next covered her head with a plastic bag. When the weather was still freezing cold in northern China, the detention center guards took Ms. Lin, who was only wearing a thin sweater, to the yard and made her stand barefoot on the concrete ground. The inmates then poured cold water over her.
Two Men in Their 80s Sentenced to Three and Five Years
Nine Falun Gong practitioners in Sichuan Province were sentenced and fined by Bazhong District Court on January 7, 2019. Among them, Mr. Zhang Xinwei, 89, was sentenced to three years in prison and fined 4,000 yuan, and Mr. Zhang Minglang, 82, was sentenced to five years and fined 10,000 yuan.
According to a court staff member, the case was overseen by the Political and Legal Affairs Committee in Sichuan Province. The committee instructed the court to sentence the practitioners to at least three years, regardless of their age. They must also be fined heavily.
The practitioners’ lawyers emphasized the lack of legal basis for the persecution and demanded that their clients be acquitted.
Mr. Zhang Xinwei walked into the courtroom with a cane and help from his family members. He recounted how his high blood pressure, hepatitis, and tuberculosis, as well as many other ailments, disappeared after he picked up the practice of Falun Gong in 1998. He also described how he recovered from a comminuted fracture in 20 days back in 2000.
Mr. Zhang Minglang, a former prosecutor himself, argued that it was his constitutional right to practice Falun Gong and that he didn’t violate any law by doing so. He credited Falun Gong for freeing him from over 30 years of suffering from liver and stomach problems, as well as severe rheumatoid arthritis.
Related report:Ten Falun Gong Practitioners Tried for Their Faith, Eight of Them in Their 70s and 80s
80-Year-Old Sentenced a Second Time for Practicing Falun Gong
Ms. Liao An’an, 80, is a retired cadre in Baiyin City, Gansu Province. She was harassed repeatedly by the police for practicing Falun Gong and detained twice. She was given five years in 2008 and incarcerated at Gansu Province Women’s Prison, where she was brutally tortured. Several times she was rushed to the emergency room after losing consciousness as a result of the abuse she suffered. In addition, she developed high blood pressure and lost 20 pounds in a short period of time.
In February 2015, Ms. Liao was sentenced to five years again by Baiyin District Court. She was denied admission by the prison due to her health condition and she was allowed to serve time at home. Her pension was later suspended.
Inner Mongolia Woman and Son Remain Imprisoned While Husband Passes Away
Ms. Tang Liwen, of Tongliao City, Inner Mongolia, used to work as a deputy section head in a metal recycling company. She was detained six times, sent to a forced labor camp twice for a total of five years, and sentenced twice for a total of 15 years, for practicing Falun Gong. Her home was also ransacked several times.
Ms. Tang, then 76, and her younger son, Mr. Wang Tao, were arrested in September 2015. They were put on trial in September 2016. Ms. Tang was given eight years and Mr. Wang seven years.
When Ms. Tang was serving a term, her mother died of grief in 2008 at the age of 90 and her husband, Mr. Wang Jiuwu, then 85, fell sick in December 2016. Whenever he was awake, he cried and said nonstop, “They are so cruel....”
He passed away on June 5, 2017. His and Ms. Tang’s older son, who is schizophrenic, was left to fend for himself.
Related report:Terrible Plight of Inner Mongolia Family for Upholding Their Faith
High Ranking Military Officer and Wife Given Heavy Sentences
Mr. Yu Changxin, a pilot of the first generation of the Air Force and a renowned professor who has edited textbooks for the Air Force Officer School, was also a member of the Falun Dafa Association. Under the order of Jiang Zemin, the former communist regime leader who ordered the persecution, Mr. Yu, then in his 70s, was secretly sentenced to 17 years in prison.
Mr. Yu Changxin
Mr. Yu’s wife, Ms. Jiang Changfeng, was 82 when she was sentenced to ten years in prison in 2001. She was held in Beijing Women’s Prison. Her health seriously deteriorated due to the long-term forced labor. The jail term should have ended on December 24, 2011. However, in November 2011, Ms. Jiang was taken to the Beijing Women’s Forced Labor Camp, where she was held for two and a half more years.
80-year-old Space Scientist and Wife Persecuted for Their Faith
Mr. Xiong Huifeng was a former researcher and deputy director of the 8358 Research Institute of the Ministry of Space Industry. He was also a director on the board of the Chinese Society of Astronautics and enjoyed a special government allowance reserved for the best scientists in the nation. He has won many awards during his career.
Because he refused to give up practicing Falun Gong in the face of persecution, he was repeatedly arrested and had his house ransacked. He was later sentenced to 7.5 years in 2015.
Six months after his latest arrest on August 26, 2014, his wife, Ms. Liu Yuanjie, also a renowned space and missile scientist and a Falun Gong practitioner, passed away on March 3, 2015, after years of police harassment. She was 79.
88-year-old Man Imprisoned to Serve One Year for His Faith
Mr. Xin Yuliang, an 88-year-old retired electronic engineer in Jilin City, Jilin Province, was arrested in August 2020 when he went out with three other practitioners to hang up banners with information about Falun Gong.
Mr. Xin was tried a year later in August 2021 and sentenced to one year by judge Li Zhongcheng. He was taken to the Gongzhuling Prison in mid-September that year.
82-year-old Sentenced for Telling People How Falun Gong Saved Their Lives
Ms. Zhao Yingcui is a retired elementary school teacher in Liupanshan City, Guizhou Province. She used to suffer from many serious ailments and was in constant pain. She had nerve-blocking injections for pain management, but the doctor’s carelessness caused damage to her nervous system and she began to lean to the right when she walked or stood. The pain made her quick to lose her temper and pick fights with her husband.
Most of her conditions went away after she learned Falun Gong in May 1997. She said she was healthier during the past two decades than when she was much younger.
Because Ms. Zhao shared her story with others, she was targeted by the authorities and sentenced to four years in prison twice, first on April 10, 2008, and then on December 14, 2012. She served the second term outside of prison. In 2019, at 82 years old, Ms. Zhao was sentenced again to five and a half years and fined 8,000 yuan.
80-year-old Sentenced to Three Years for Having Meal
Mr. Wang Shengli, 80, is a former Propaganda Department Head in Fuyang City, Anhui Province. He was sentenced to four years in 2004 for his faith. After his release, the CCP officials ordered him to write a statement to give up his practice before he could resume his pension, but he refused.
When Mr. Wang went to Linquan County to meet with other practitioners on December 6, 2010, for a meal, when he and eight local practitioners including Ms. Ma Yuling, were arrested. Mr. Wang was later sentenced to three years.
Other Cases of Elderly Practitioners Who Were Sentenced:
Mr. Zheng Decai from Dalian City, Liaoning Province, was arrested on September 4, 2017, after being reported for talking to people about Falun Gong. He was sentenced to one and a half years in prison in June 2018. He was taken to the Nanguanling Prison on June 14 that year but was denied admission after failing the physical examination. He was returned to the detention center, where he exhibited symptoms of high blood pressure and abnormally rapid heart rate two days later. He also coughed up blood.
Mr. Zheng was accepted by Dalian Prison on August 6, 2018. When his family went to visit him on September 13, 2018, they were denied the meeting because Mr. Zheng had refused to give up practicing Falun Gong. He had lost his hearing after being beaten hard by the police when he went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong in 2000.
Mr. Hao Fukui, 82, became healthy after practicing Falun Gong and often lent a hand to those in need. He was sentenced to three years in 2018 and detained at Dalian Prison.
Mr. Zhou Yi, 81, a retired associate professor at the Naval Aeronautical and Astronautical University in Nanjing City, Jiangsu Province, mailed a criminal complaint in June 2015 to the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, accusing former Chinese dictator Jiang Zemin of launching the brutal suppression of Falun Gong that led to his tremendous suffering. Mr. Zhou was arrested by 20 to 30 policemen on August 17, 2016, and tried on March 1, 2017. He was later sent to Suzhou Prison.
A centenarian in Hefei City, Anhui Province went to the Shushan District Court with her granddaughter on January 21, 2019, to appeal to judge Ni Na for the release of her 80-year-old daughter Ms. Gao Zonghua. The 100-year-old woman was turned away by the judge. Ms. Gao was later sentenced to one year and fined 2,000 yuan.
Ms. Wang Yunji, in her 80s and from Penglai City, Shandong Province, was sentenced to seven years for reading Falun Gong books with nine other Falun Gong practitioners who were in their 70s and 80s, in February 2012. The other practitioners were given four to seven years in prison.
Mr. Guo Yunian, 85, was arrested at home on July 19, 2019. He was sentenced to six years later that month. On August 6, 2020, the police took Mr. Guo to Jilin Prison. His family wasn’t allowed to visit him or send him clothes or daily necessities.
Ms. Zhang Shuxiang, 81 and from Tianjin, was secretly sentenced to four years by the Nankai District Court. Her family was not informed of the verdict. Ms. Zhang appealed against the verdict. She was later taken to Tianjin Women’s Prison. Due to the long-term persecution, Ms. Zhang lost her sight in her left eye and is suffering from vision loss in her right eye. She also struggles with a heart condition.
Ms. Qu Shuyun, from Daxinganling in Heilongjiang Province, was arrested many times for practicing Falun Gong and was once held at a forced labor camp. In 2017, Ms. Qu, then 86, was sentenced to three years of probation and fined 3,000 yuan.
Mr. Yang Xiyuan from Changzhou City, Jiangsu Province, was sentenced to two years and taken to Suzhou Prison on January 4, 2018, at the age of 82. Prior to his latest sentencing, he had also served a seven-year term.
Ms. Hong Shuyun, an 81-year-old resident of Fushun City, Liaoning Province, was sentenced to two years on June 25, 2019, and fined 5,000 yuan.
Ms. Ding Ziqing, 83, was arrested and had her home ransacked in 2017. She was arrested again in 2018 and released on bail. On May 22, 2019, Ms. Ding was tried by Shushan District Court and sentenced to two years and fined 3,000 yuan. She was allowed to serve time outside of the prison as she was in poor health.
Mr. Wang Xuebin, 81, of Fuyang City, Anhui Province, was bedridden for more than a month when the police issued an arrest warrant on July 19, 2017. The reason for the arrest was due to his high prestige among the practitioners in Fuyang City.
Elderly Practitioners Harassed, Arrested, and Beaten
Persecution of Falun Dafa Claims the Lives of Four People in the Same Family
Four members of Ms. Kan Zhixi’s family in Yi County, Liaoning Province died within eight years of each other as a result of the persecution of their faith.
Ms. Kan’s son, Mr. Zuo Zhongyou, was a middle school teacher. He was twice detained at a forced labor camp. He endured a great deal of physical and mental trauma due to the persecution and subsequent long-term abuse. His heart, lungs, and kidneys deteriorated and he suffered brain damage. He passed away on May 29, 2006, at the age of 35.
Ms. Kan’s aunt, Ms. Kan Yiren, 80, was a Chinese medicine doctor. She was often harassed and monitored by the police. She was also detained thrice. She passed away on June 28, 2008.
Ms. Kan’s 86-year-old father, Mr. Kan Zetian, and her 87-year-old mother, Ms. Long Xiuying, were arrested many times and detained. They were also threatened and harassed. They passed away in 2014 and 2012, respectively.
Mr. Kan Zetian
Ms. Long Xiuying
90-Year-Old Ms. Zou Guiqin, from Inner Mongolia, Arrested
Ms. Zou Guiqin, 90, from Balinzuo Banner, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, suddenly lost consciousness on July 16, 2010, and was taken to the hospital. She was unconscious for seven days. Although she was resuscitated, she was subsequently paralyzed for one-and-a-half years and in severe pain every day.
Ms. Zou heard that many patients had recovered after sincerely reciting “Falun Dafa is good,” so she decided to recite the phrases morning and evening. Six months after she started reciting the phrase she was able to walk slowly with the help of a walker. She decided to learn how to do the Falun Dafa exercises. Six months later, she had completely recovered and could take care of herself again.
On November 18, 2018, Ms. Zou was arrested by three officers from the Balinzuo Banner Police Station when she was putting up Falun Dafa flyers. After being taken to the police station, she was ordered to sign a statement to renounce Falun Gong, or she would be detained. Under intense pressure, Ms. Zou became frightened and fainted. She was released two hours later.
Professor Repeatedly Harassed for His Faith
Mr. Xie Kun, a professor at Shiyou University in Xi’an City, Shaanxi Province, and previously the director of the school’s academic affairs office and the librarian, had several illnesses before practicing Falun Gong. He once fainted during his class due to a high fever.
In 1997, Mr. Xie started practicing Falun Gong and his health improved. He also became kinder and was able to put himself in others’ shoes when encountering problems. After his health improved, others commented that he looked like someone in his 60s though he was nearly 80 years old. His older sister also recovered from advanced liver cancer after practicing Falun Gong.
Due to the persecution, Mr. Xie and his wife had to live away from home to avoid being arrested. In May 2018, the couple went back to their workplace to settle some matters before returning to Shandong Province, where one of them grew up. However, they were detained for five hours after their flagged IDs were scanned at the Qingdao train station. The police took them to Hebei Province, where another one of the couples grew up, on June 4, 2018, and instructed local police to monitor them. Afterward, police went to their home to harass them. The police also harassed their son via phone calls.
Police Officer to Falun Gong Practitioner in His 80s: “It’s Fine to Beat You to Death”
Mr. Chen Zaishan, in his 80s and from Haiyang City, Shandong Province, was doing some light farm work when a group of officers showed up and arrested him on the morning of November 9, 2018. The police ransacked his home and confiscated his Falun Gong books in front of his bedridden wife. Then they took him to the Kaifa District Police Station, where a police officer beat him.
When Mr. Chen protested the officer beating him, the officer responded: “It’s fine for us to beat Falun Gong practitioners to death.”
Mr. Chen passed away in the winter of 2022.
87-year-old Woman Unable to Care for Herself After Being Arrested
Ms. Chen Fuzhen, 87, from Mianyang City, Sichuan Province, was arrested many times for practicing Falun Gong. She was later sentenced to three and a half years and ordered to serve her term in her rented apartment. However, she ripped up the verdict and moved to another place to rent a house again.
On September 17, 2019, the police from Santai County went to Ms. Chen’s godson’s tea house and arrested her. The police said that they were going through the formalities of her previous sentence. Due to the tremendous pressure, Ms. Chen slipped and fell after she was released. She hurt her left leg and needed someone to take care of her.
85-year-old Woman Given Unknown Drugs at Brainwashing Center
Ms. Luo Shuyun from Qingyang District, Chengdu City, Sichuan Province, was harassed by the police in January 2018. She told the police that she was often harassed by them and even sent to the local brainwashing center. The police secretly recorded her while she was telling them about her persecution.
Ms. Luo was arrested on July 19, 2009. The police tried to force her to renounce her faith but she refused. She was later sent to Xinjin Brainwashing Center and was given unknown drugs. Due to the poisoning, her body continues to be itchy and painful to this day.
86-Year-Old Former Model Worker and His Wife Harassed for Practicing Falun Gong
Mr. Guo Deyou, an 86-year-old former model worker in Tianjin, his wife, and their daughter have been repeatedly targeted for practicing Falun Gong. The total time they have been incarcerated adds up to 31.5 years.
On October 15, 2022, only two months following Mr. Guo’s daughter’s release, he and his wife Ms. Han Yuxia were arrested while visiting another local practitioner. Over ten officers ransacked their home and confiscated their Falun Gong books, computer, and printer.
Two officers harassed the couple again on February 13, 2023. They said that Mr. Guo had been placed on conditional bail and that he wasn’t allowed to leave Tianjin without their permission. They also warned him not to have “illegal” items at home.
Ms. Li Yuanqin, 80, is a retired teacher from Caishi Street Primary School in the Jiangjin District of Chongqing. Her pension was suspended in early 2016 because she filed a lawsuit against former Chinese Communist Party head Jiang Zemin. Her husband, who is over 80, lives in a care home. The Party secretary of Caishi Street Primary School threatened that her salary would not be reinstated if she renounced her faith.
In addition to the couple’s loss of income, Ms. Li has had to deal with the stress caused by harassment from local authorities. She became blind in one eye and is now unable to live independently.
81-year-old Forced to Wear a Wristwatch-style Monitoring Locator After Her Release
Ms. Fan Qinxia of Wuhan City, Hubei Province, was arrested and detained in March 2016. Her home was also ransacked. Ms. Fan was sentenced to one year in February 2018 when she was 80. After her release, she was arrested again in April 2019. The police forced her to wear a wristwatch-style monitoring locator to monitor her whereabouts at any time. The police threatened to send her to prison if she refused to wear it. They also forced her to pay 300 yuan for the monitoring device.
Elderly Practitioner Relentlessly Harassed and Forced to Leave Home
Two elderly Falun Gong practitioners from Benxi City, Liaoning Province—83-year-old Ms. Cong Fulan and 76-year-old Ms. Zhao Guirong—were arrested on June 9, 2018, by officers from the Caitun Police Station for distributing informational DVDs about Falun Gong. The policemen ransacked their homes, and they were taken to the Benxi Detention Center at 1:30 a.m.
Detention center officials fined the police station 20,000 yuan as compensation for having them detain the two elderly practitioners. Unwilling to pay, police station officials agreed to release the women on parole. In the meantime, they turned the case over to the Benxi City Procuratorate, intending to indict the two practitioners. Later, the police harassed the practitioners. Ms. Cong was forced to leave her home because of continued harassment by police.
Ms. Cong was previously sentenced to 8 years by the Xihu District Court in Benxi City in 2001, when she was 66, for practicing Falun Gong.
80-year-old Harassed While Caring for 103-year-old Mother
An 80-year-old woman in Shengli Oilfield, Dongying City, Shandong Province, lived with her 103-year-old mother and cared for her. However, she was harassed by the police for practicing Falun Gong. The police knocked on her door and window and shouted loudly for her to open the door. Worried that her mother was frightened, she asked the police not to harass her but they refused.
Actions Bear Consequences
Many officers participated in the persecution to gain political advancement. But as the saying goes, “What goes around comes around, ” whatever one does, it will be judged accordingly and no one would be able to get away for doing evil.
Below are a few cases of police officers receiving karmic retribution for their roles in the persecution.
Mr. Yin Yucai was a former presiding judge of the Duchang County Criminal Court and former director of the Duchang County Parasitic Disease Treatment and Prevention Facility in Jiangxi Province. He had developed a mental disorder caused by physical and mental torture during his 11 years of imprisonment.
Mr. Yin Yucai
In January 2014, Mr. Yin was arrested for telling people about Falun Gong. When his family went to Changdu Domestic Security Division to demand his release. Mr. Yin’s brother said, “My brother Yucai is 85 - how can you refuse to release him?” Hong Liu, head of the Domestic Security Division, said, “We’d keep him jailed even if he was 95.” He was secretly sentenced to three years and two months in prison on June 13, 2014.
After Hong was involved in persecuting Falun Gong practitioners, his body was in pain for a long term. His older brother was electrocuted and died after he went fishing. His wife had hysterectomy surgery in 2014. After Mr. Yin was sentenced, Hong was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2015. He was in his 40s. Two of his co-workers, Huang Yihui and Zhang Shixin, who also took part in the persecution, faced similar consequences. Huang became disabled after a car accident; Zhang has sudden cerebral thrombosis and is paralyzed on one side of his body.
Two other officers in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, also faced consequences for persecuting Falun Gong practitioners.
Mr. Zhao Liuzhu, an 82-year-old retiree of Xinzheng City Forestry Bureau in Henan Province, was arrested in 2017 for seeking the release of his son-in-law, Mr. Shi Runshan. Two other practitioners who went to visit Mr. Zhao after his release was also arrested and detained.
Although Fan Hongbin, who ordered the practitioners’ arrests, was promoted to the head of the Domestic Security Division, he died in a car accident on February 17, 2019, at the age of 47. His co-worker, Liu Jianwu, a Party secretary of Xinzheng City, died a year later from a sudden myocardial infarction.