(Minghui.org)
Name: Feng YuqiuChinese Name: 冯玉秋Gender: FemaleAge: 73City: ShulanProvince: JilinOccupation: Retired middle school teacherDate of Death: October 9, 2024Date of Most Recent Arrest: June 5, 2024Most Recent Place of Detention: Beicheng Police Station
Having endured two decades of repeated arrests and harassment for practicing Falun Gong, Ms. Feng Yuqiu’s health further declined following her latest arrest on June 5, 2024. She passed away three months later on October 9, 2024. She was 73.
Ms. Feng, a retired teacher from the Qili Township 25th Middle School in Shulan City, Jilin Province, served two labor camp terms and was held in a brainwashing center twice after the Chinese communist regime ordered the persecution of Falun Gong in 1999. She suffered relentless torture in custody, which took a toll on her health and left her mentally traumatized.
Ms. Feng was first arrested in February 2000 near Tiananmen Square, when she went to Beijing to appeal for the right to practice Falun Gong. She was taken to a police station nearby and then to the Jilin Province Liaison Office in Beijing. A female officer seized the 150 yuan in cash she had on her. Two days later, she was escorted back to Shulan and held in the Shulan City Lockup for five days. Officers with the Qili Township Police Station extorted 1,500 yuan from her and the local education bureau extorted 3,500 yuan.
Ms. Feng returned to Beijing on December 19, 2000, to appeal. She displayed a banner that said “Falun Dafa Is Good” on Tiananmen Square and was arrested again. She had a big swelling on her head after the police hit her with a baton. Other practitioners who were there appealing were also beaten.
After taking Ms. Feng to the station, the police attempted to take her photo. They beat her when she refused to comply. She was also deprived of sleep for refusing to give her name.
The police later transferred Ms. Feng to the local detention center. During a force-feeding episode, they punched her in the mouth and head, stomped on her feet, and force-fed her brine. Later on, the guards injured her when they inserted a force-feeding tube into her nose. Her nose and throat bled.
Three days later, Ms. Feng was taken to the Jingjing County Police Department in Hebei Province. Three officers shocked her with electric batons on her face, ears, and hands. They also forced her to kneel, pulled her arms behind her back, and then jerked them up, causing excruciating pain in her shoulder joints.
The officers pulled her hair until large clumps fell out. They forced her to kneel on a concrete floor and put a long wooden stick across her calves. Then two men took turns rolling the stick back and forth like a rolling pin on top of her calves and feet. While interrogating her, they put more and more pressure on the stick until she could no longer bear it. After stopping briefly, they repeated the torture three more times. Her calves became so swollen that she could not take off her underwear. She was unable to move her legs and had to be carried back to the cell. She had to crawl to the bathroom. The torture left some of her toes permanantly deformed.
Ms. Feng was later given one year in the Heizuizi Forced Labor Camp. She was subjected to relentless physical torture for not giving up Falun Gong. In addition to forcing her to work more than ten hours a day without pay, the guards made her watch propaganda videos slandering Falun Gong, write monthly thought reports, and attend other events praising the Chinese Communist Party.
When her term expired, the guards intimidated her and ordered her to renounce Falun Gong. She refused to comply and was slapped in the face.
An agent of the Shulan City 610 Office and Wen Changji of the local education bureau harassed Ms. Feng at her school in the summer of 2002. They said that they were given a quota to “transform” a Falun Gong practitioner and ordered her to cooperate. She firmed refused.
Ms. Feng was arrested again in 2007 and taken to a brainwashing center. She was arrested at home at 4 a.m. on August 11 in the same year by the school leadership and the police. They took her to the Xiangshui Dam Brainwashing Center in Jishu Town, Shulan. She still refused to renounce Falun Gong despite being bombarded with their brainwashing efforts and was fined 1,000 yuan.
Due to her continued efforts to raise awareness about the persecution, Ms. Feng was arrested another time on January 7, 2012, by Shao Tianfeng, the chief of Xiaocheng Police Station. She was held in the Shulan City Lockup and later given another forced labor camp term.
She was arrested one more time on January 27, 2016, for talking to people about Falun Gong at the grocery market. Beicheng Police Station officers gave her ten days of detention.
Someone knocked on her door around 6 a.m. on July 26, 2022, but she didn’t open the door. The person came back around 8 a.m. and called her name.
Due to the ongoing harassment, Ms. Feng began to experience health issues. Since 2023, the condition of her legs and toes that were severely injured due to torture in custody quickly deteriorated, leaving her unable to walk. She also struggled with declining vision. She took a fall and broke her legs.
Before she fully recovered, the police seized her during a group arrest on June 5, 2024, and held her briefly at the Beicheng Police Station. She was released on bail, only to die three months later.