(Minghui.org) Ms. Sun Shuyun, a Harbin City, Heilongjiang Province, resident in her 70s, was taken to the Heilongjiang Province Women’s Prison on February 9, 2024 to serve a six-year term for practicing Falun Gong.
Since the Chinese communist regime began to persecute Falun Gong in 1999, Ms. Sun was arrested more than ten times. Following an arrest in July 2022, the police took away her Falun Gong books, portrait of Falun Gong’s founder, and her ID. Three months later in October 2022, the police began to monitor her daily activities.
Ms. Sun made several attempts to persuade the police not to participate in the persecution and to return her ID and Falun Gong related items, but to no avail. To seek justice, she filed a complaint against Yu You of the Xinyi Street Police Station with the Daowai District Procuratorate. Instead of seeing her case addressed, Ms. Sun was arrested on May 20, 2023 and her arrest was approved by the procuratorate five days later. The police told her sister that they arrested her in retaliation for her complaint against Yu.
While she was held in the Harbin City Second Detention Center, Ms. Sun started a hunger strike on June 14 to protest the persecution. She also refused to wear the inmate’s uniform or follow the guard’s order to sit on a small stool for hours on end, a common torture method used in Chinese detention centers and prisons.
Ms. Sun’s sister went to the Daowai District Procuratorate on July 3, 2023 to ask about her case. Prosecutor Shao Mengnan said they were angry that Ms. Sun dared to go on a hunger strike in protest.
Prosecutor Shao indicted Ms. Sun in August and moved her case to the Daowai District Court. When Ms. Sun’s lawyer visited her on August 3, she had resumed eating. According to the lawyer, she only weighed 66 lbs, and her hands and feet were numb, but her overall mental condition was good.
The Daowai District Court held a hearing of Ms. Sun’s case on September 4, 2023. Presiding judge Chen Zhongyan only allowed two of her family members into the courtroom. Ms. Sun’s lawyer entered a not guilty plea for her. She also testified in her own defense. The session was adjourned in thirty minutes.
The judge sentenced Ms. Sun to six years on November 25, 2023. She was transferred to the prison on February 9, 2024, the eve of Chinese New Year.
Related Report:
Woman in Her 70s On Hunger Strike Since Mid-June to Protest Arbitrary Detention for Her Faith
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