57-Year-Old Ms. Cao Guifang Dies as a Result of Persecution in Gansu Province

Name: Cao Guifang
Gender: Female
Age: 57
Address: Zhuangnan Group, Wangzhuang Village, Xiaojin Town, Xifeng District, Qingyang City, Gansu Province
Occupation: Farmer
Date of Death: March 3rd, 2010
Date of Most Recent Arrest: April 25th, 2003
Most Recent Place of Detention: Zhengning County Detention Centre
City: Jilin
Province: Jilin
Persecution Suffered: Sleep deprivation, forced labour, brainwashing, beatings, hung up, torture, extortion, physical restraint, home ransacked, interrogation, detention, denial of toilet use

Ms. Cao Guifang started cultivating Falun Gong in 1997. She was an illiterate farmer's wife, but she was able to read Falun Gong books within one year of beginning her cultivation practice. Once, she found 10,000 yuan¹, and waited there for almost a whole day to find the owner. The town government praised her merit. All of Ms. Cao's sicknesses disappeared in less than six months after she started practising. Her friends and family witnessed the wonderfulness of Falun Gong through the changes she experienced, and many began practising Falun Gong after seeing the immense changes in Ms. Cao.

After the persecution began on July 20th, 1999, Ms. Cao was arrested multiple times and detained, her home was ransacked, and she was sentenced to a forced labour camp. At the labour camp, Ms. Cao was once handcuffed with her arms behind her back and hung up by her arms while four drug addicted prisoners beat her.

On July 21st, 1999, at a few minutes past 4 o'clock in the afternoon, police officer Han Yong and others arrested Cao Guifang and detained her at the local police station for twenty-four hours.

On February 22nd, 2000, Cao Guifang went to Beijing for the first time to appeal for justice for Falun Gong. When she returned home, Fu Yikui, Zheng Xiang and several other police officers arrested her, and jailed her for one month at the Xifeng Detention Facility. Subsequently, she was put in a brainwashing class to be transformed.

On November 1st, 2000, Shao Jun and three other police officers from the city police station brought Cao Guifang to the station, where they tortured and interrogated her. The police also searched her home and confiscated her family property. Before leaving, they extorted 500 yuan from Cao Guifang's husband. Ms. Cao escaped by climbing over the wall at night, but she had no place to go. She became homeless for over ninety days.

In February 2001, the police brought Cao Guifang to the City Detention Facility and jailed her for 42 days. She was then transferred to a Drug-Addiction Rehab Centre for another fifteen days of persecution. On April 12th, 2001, Ms. Cao was secretly sentenced to eighteen months of forced labour.

At the forced labour camp, Ms. Cao was inhumanly tortured. The police forced her to carry huge rocks. In addition, they did not allow her to drink water or use the toilet. They also forced her to stand still for long periods of time. The guards tried to force Ms. Cao to write the so-called "repentance statement" (renouncing Falun Gong) and she was forced to wear handcuffs for eight consecutive days. Ms. Cao's feet became swollen from the torture. Even after she was released, the police went to Ms. Cao's home again to try to force her to write the repentance statement.

On April 25th, 2003, police officers Yang Jinbao, Fan Zhe and others arrested Ms. Cao again and brought her to the local police station. She was sent to the city police office and then secretly transferred to the Detention Centre in Zhengning County. She was kept in the detention centre for more than fifty days, and the authorities planned to secretly sentence her again to another three years in prison. After her husband went to the police office and demanded that she be released, Ms. Cao was finally allowed to return home.

In mid February 2005, police officers Fan Zhe and Yang Jinpo brought Ms. Cao to the local police station once again for interrogation.

During the ongoing persecution, Ms. Cao was confined at the police station five times, detained at a detention facility three times, sent to a labour camp once, and sent to a drug rehab centre once. In addition, Ms. Cao's business was searched three times, her home was searched and her belongings confiscated twice, she was bodily searched once, and she was fined a total of 1,200 yuan. The relentless persecution took a toll on Ms. Cao, and she passed away on March 3rd, 2010.

Note

1. "Yuan" is the Chinese currency; 500 yuan is equal to the average monthly income of an urban worker in China.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2010/3/19/220000.html