Belated News: Sichuan Woman Jailed for 2.5 Years for Practicing Falun Gong

(Minghui.org) Ms. Luo Qiongying from Chengdu City, Sichuan Province, served a 2.5-year prison term from June 15, 2014 to December 14, 2016 for practicing Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.

Ms. Luo, a teacher at the Sichuan Provincial Women’s Cadre School, was fired on November 27, 2015. After she was released from prison, she faced continued harassment from the local police and community, with the most recent episode on September 25, 2023.

Ms. Luo took up Falun Gong around 1998 and soon recovered from her liver disease, kidney disease, stomach disease, pharyngitis, constipation, hemorrhoids, anemia, palpitations, insomnia, breast lumps, and depression. She held firm to her faith after the persecution began in 1999 and was arrested in 2014, resulting in a 2.5-year prison term.

Arrest

Ms. Luo was passing by No. 66 Shiren North Road in Qingyang District at 4:00 p.m. on June 14, 2014, when security guard Deng Zhiyong suddenly came at her and punched her in the eyes, all the while yelling, “There is a reward for catching Falun Gong practitioners!” Her eyes became swollen and she was later examined at the Chengdu West District Hospital, although it is unclear when that happened.

Officers from the Funan Police Station searched Ms. Luo without producing their IDs. They seized the more than 2,000 yuan in cash and two cell phones she had on her. These valuables were not returned to her.

Ms. Luo was then taken to the police station for interrogation. She refused to answer any questions. The police found her home address through her electric bike registration. They raided her home that night without a search warrant and seized everything related to Falun Gong.

Because her household registration was in the Caotang area, the Caotang Police Station officers picked her up from the Funan Police Station that night. She again refused to answer their questions and urged the police to stop persecuting Falun Gong practitioners.

While walking to the restroom after she was interrogated, Ms. Luo saw a few officers tallying the items that were confiscated from her home, when neither she nor her family was present.

Indictment and Sentencing

The Qingyang District Procuratorate issued a formal arrest warrant for Ms. Luo on June 27, 2014. The Qingyang District Police Department took over her case the same day. They interrogated her several times.

Prosecutors Wang Wei and Zhang Zhenhua indicted Ms. Luo on March 2, 2015. She stood trial at the Qingyang District Court on March 18, 2015. The presiding judge was Zhao Yong, who was assisted by judges He Buyi and Xue Yi, and clerk Yang Yifan.

Ms. Luo was sentenced to two and a half years on April 30, 2015. Her appeal was rejected by the Chengdu City Intermediate Court on August 13, 2015. The presiding judge, Li Zongmin, judges Shao Long and He Rong, as well as clerk Wei Shuai signed the appeals ruling.

Abused at a Detention Center

While her appeal was still pending, Ms. Luo was taken to the Pidu District Detention Center on the morning of June 15, 2014, by three police officers (Li, Luo, and another whose name is not known) from the Caotang Police Station.

Ms. Luo was assigned to cell 0907. As soon as she stepped inside the cell, four inmates swarmed her, pried open her mouth and removed her dentures (the whereabouts of the dentures are still unknown).

The guards interrogated her numerous times. Once guard Chen verbally abused her using extremely foul language.

According to the detention center’s rules, all female detainees were strip-searched each time after they are interrogated or meet with lawyers. The guards checked every inch of their bodies. Ms. Luo was also strip-searched many times.

The words that the detainees heard the most often were “hurry up.” If practitioners were deemed slow when they did things or followed orders, they were punished by doing night shifts without sleeping. They had to rush even during mealtimes and often swallowed the food before they chewed it thoroughly. They were also stopped before they finished their meals.

At times Ms. Luo’s cell housed more than 50 inmates, making using the toilet and washing themselves extremely difficult. Some people had to sleep on the floor, which was rinsed with water after each meal and was always damp.

Ms. Luo couldn’t fall asleep in such conditions. Early on November 30, 2014, she sat up and did the Falun Gong meditation because she wasn't able to sleep. Guard Zhang forced her and all her cellmates to sit on a big board motionless for seven days to instigate the inmates to hate her. She went on a hunger strike in protest the next day. The guards instructed two inmates to watch her around the clock.

The guards took Ms. Luo out of her cell on December 22, 2014, to draw her blood. She suspected that they were trying to see if she was a good candidate for the forced organ harvesting and refused to comply. A male guard threatened to beat her and a female guard stopped him. But they got three inmates to hold her down. She kept resisting and they had another five inmates come grab her. That still did not work. Eventually they got another group of seven inmates. Together with the doctor they drew her blood.

Besides the torture, Ms. Luo was also forced to clean her cell every day. Sometimes the inmates used white toilet paper to repeatedly wipe all the surfaces to see if there was still any dirt. If there was, they punished her by making her do night shifts.

The constant abuse plus lack of nutrition ruined Ms. Luo’s health. When she scrubbed the towels used to clean the floor and wrung them out, the capillaries in her hands ruptured and bled. This happened several times. She was later found to have severe high blood pressure.

Admitted to Chengdu City Women’s Prison

Ms. Luo was transferred to the Chengdu City Women’s Prison on November 11, 2015. Warden Mao Xin was newly appointed around that time and under his directive, the persecution of jailed Falun Gong practitioners kept intensifying.

The prison had six divisions, with division one being designated for newly admitted inmates. Falun Gong practitioners, however, were not put in division one upon admission. Instead, they were directly assigned to other divisions. Divisions 2 and 6 were the strict management divisions where steadfast practitioners were sent.

Division 6 had three cells on the 4th, 5th, and 6th floors respectively that were known as the strict management cells specifically used to persecute steadfast practitioners. These cells, 412, 512, and 612, were dubbed “prisons within prisons.” There was a cordon outside the cells and other inmates usually couldn’t see what was going on there. Ordinary cells had twelve people each, but the three special cells only housed five or six (only one was a Falun Gong practitioner and the rest were her monitors). As the persecution continued to escalate, the three cells often only had three people (one practitioner plus two monitors).

Ms. Luo was made to stay in all three cells during her 13 months of incarceration at the prison.

Mouth Stuffed with Socks Moments After Admission

Ms. Luo was directly assigned to division 6 when she was admitted to the prison. She urged guard Zhao Hongmei to stop persecuting Falun Gong practitioners and was verbally abused.

Zhao, along with inmates Pu Xiuqiong and Ou Pinglan, next brought Ms. Luo to the cafeteria to search the items she brought into the prison with her. She also urged them to stop persecuting Falun Gong practitioners. Zhao ordered the two inmates to stuff her mouth with socks. Ou pushed her against the wall and took the socks that Pu removed from her feet, and pressed them hard into her mouth.

After the socks were removed 20 minutes later, Ms. Luo saw bloodstains on them.

Ms. Luo decided not to report the incident to the prison administration after Zhao apologized to her. She learned later that Zhao’s apology was insincere and just a show of her “carrot-and-stick” tactic in trying to make Ms. Luo renounce Falun Gong.

Abused in Cell 512

Ou and Pu were instructed to watch Ms. Luo around the clock. As soon as she was assigned to cell 512 on the afternoon of her prison admission, the two inmates ordered her to write various statements to renounce and denounce Falun Gong. She refused to comply. They didn't let her go to bed until after midnight but woke her up at 5 in the morning. Two other inmates surnamed Gan and Luo were also assigned to monitor Ms. Luo.

On the third morning of her prison admission, Ms. Luo was taken to the prison hospital. Pu, Ou, and another inmate whose name was unknown, together with two doctors, pressed her down and drew her blood. The male doctor stabbed her arm three times with a metal spike afterwards, causing blood to gush out and her arm to hurt for a long time.

Ms. Luo was not allowed to leave the cell. The inmates brought food to her but the amount was very little. She was often hungry. She had to stand or sit on a small stool for at least 13 to 18 hours a day during the 13 months she was incarcerated there. Her legs became extremely swollen. She couldn’t walk steadily. Her systolic blood pressure reached 199 mmHg at one point (when a normal range is 120 or lower).

Abused in Cell 612

Guard Zhang changed Ms. Luo’s monitors to inmates Wan Yongyi and Liu Xin on December 3, 2015 and moved her to cell 612.

One morning the porridge given to her didn’t taste right. She suspected it was laced with unknown drugs. When she told Wan about it, Wan became furious and threatened her. She and Liu forced Ms. Luo to clean the cell every day.

Abused in Cell 412

Ms. Luo was transferred to cell 412 on March 21, 2016. Inmates Liu and Pu were the monitors.

In April 2016, the prison installed a TV and DVD player in cell 412. They forced Ms. Luo to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong on high volume almost every day.

To make her suffer, the guards moved the bed right under a ceiling fan. For several months straight, they kept the fan on the highest setting to blow on Ms. Luo all night long.

In early July 2016, inmate Yuan Ling replaced Pu to monitor Ms. Luo together with Liu. One day vice head Tian Li of division six came to say that the prison arranged two people with the highest degrees to “work on” her. Both Yuan and Liu had Master’s degrees and were government officials before they were convicted for bribery. They attempted to make Ms. Luo give up Falun Gong but failed. In retaliation, the prison denied her family visits and barred other forms of communication since July 2016.

The guards switched monitors to inmates Yuan and Wan on September 28, 2016. She still remained firm in her faith. In the winter of 2016, they forced her to throw away her clothes and did not allow her to use her own comforters even when the weather got colder.

On the afternoon of November 14, 2016, the prison ordered all inmates in division 6 to give blood and saliva samples. Ms. Luo refused to comply as she suspected the purpose was for the purpose of forced organ harvesting. She reported her concerns to vice division head Tan Xuemei. The guards did not force her to give blood and saliva samples then. Three days later, however, four inmates and a guard came to press her down to collect her fingerprints and blood samples.

Before her prison release, guard Zhao ordered Ms. Luo to sign some forms. She refused and Zhao berated her using extremely foul language.

Continued Harassment After Prison Release

When Ms. Luo was released on December 14, 2016, she weighed only about 90 pounds. The Caotang Police Station, the Caotang Street Committee, and the Songxianqiao Community repeatedly harassed her. The most severe episode took place on September 25, 2023.

At 4 p.m. that day, Ms. Luo was walking down Xieyang Road, when two men bumped into her on purpose. One of them then accused her of knocking his phone out of his hands and breaking it. He reported her to the Caotang Police Station.

Ms. Luo had a gut feeling that the two men and the police were trying to frame her. She refused to go with them and several women from the local community came. The police left and the women deceived Ms. Luo into going to a nearby tea shop.

One of the women said the local Political and Legal Affairs Committee entrusted them to talk to her. Ms. Luo asked their names and they said they were surnamed Li, Zhang, Feng, and Luo (no relation). They claimed they didn’t have their IDs with them and remained silent when Ms. Luo demanded to know the legal basis for the “talk.” They refused to give their full names or phone numbers.

Ms. Luo said it was not illegal to practice Falun Gong in China and urged them to stop persecuting Falun Gong. A woman officer then suddenly showed up and yelled at her. Ms. Luo noted the woman officer’s badge number was 007171.

The officer then left. Zhang took out a form to give to Feng, who then ordered Ms. Luo to sign. She refused and they insisted she sign. After a long standoff, Zhang flew into a rage. She slammed her hand on the table and yelled at Ms. Luo.

While Ms. Luo was not paying attention, Zhang grabbed her right hand and pressedred ink on it to collect her fingerprint.

The woman surnamed Luo used the same trick to collect Ms. Luo’s fingerprints on another form.

Ms. Luo later learned Zhang’s full name was Zhang Xuemei.

The women did not let Ms. Luo leave the tea shop until after 8:30 p.m. As she left, she saw a police car leaving, which confirmed her suspicion: the two men who bumped into her on the sidewalk, the women, and the police were all coordinating to persecute her.