Ms. Gong Ruiping, a Teacher from Beijing Who Suffered Repeated Persecution, Imprisoned Again

Name: Gong Ruiping
Gender: Female
Age: 48
Address: Miyun District, Beijing
Occupation: Teacher
Date of Most Recent Arrest: August 29th, 2012
Most Recent Place of Detention: Beijing Women's Forced Labour Camp
City: Beijing
Persecution Suffered: Electric shock, sleep deprivation, forced labour, brainwashing, forced drug administration, beatings, hung up, imprisonment, solitary confinement, torture, sexual assault, force-feedings, fired from workplace, physical restraint, home ransacked, detention, denial of toilet use
Key Persecutors: Wang Qiying, Wang Hongjing, Li Cuilan, Hu Dongshan, Tian Fengqing, Li Xiaobing, Li Xiaomei, Xi Xuehui and Chen Jin, Huang Qinghua

Ms. Gong Ruiping, a former teacher at Chengguan Elementary School, lost her job because she refused to renounce Falun Gong, and has suffered brutal persecution physically and mentally. In 2012, Ms. Gong began teaching in a private preschool in the Miyun District of Beijing. She was arrested at her home in the Miyun District on August 29th, 2012. She was later sentenced to two years and nine months of forced labour, and is being detained in the Beijing Women's Forced Labour Camp.

1. Brutally Tortured in the Beijing Daxing Forced Labour Camp

Ms. Gong was a teacher at Chengguan Elementary School in the Pinggu District, Beijing. After the persecution of Falun Gong began, the officials from the Pinggu District Education Bureau fired her because she refused to renounce Falun Gong.

Pinggu County Education Bureau officials and officers from the Pinggu County Police Department, more than 20 people in all, went to Ms. Gong's home in July 2001 and arrested her. She was taken to the brainwashing centre in Daxing Xin'an Forced Labour Camp in Beijing. Upon her arrival, the guards brutally slapped her. Wang Qiying, an official from the Pinggu County Education Bureau, stuffed her month with paper, pinched her nose, and covered her eyes. She was unable to breathe and lost consciousness. After she came to, they pulled her hair and repeatedly banged her head against the wall and punched her face. She lost consciousness again. When she woke up, she had lost her memory. She stared at people and shouted at them. The guards were shocked and scared.

She was later sent to a hotel for more brainwashing sessions. When she woke up, she saw that her face was swollen and full of bruises. She could barely open her left eye. Both of her knees were injured and dripping blood, and her skirt was torn.

The next day, Wang Hongjing, the director of the Pinggu County 610 Office (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong), Wang Qiying, Li Cuilan, and section chief Yang (given name unknown) from the Beijing Police Department tried to force her to renounce Falun Gong. They pulled her out of bed and beat her. Seeing that she did not give up, Wang Qiying threw something at her face. She immediately felt dizzy and lost her hearing. They then poured cold water on her several times until she ceased to respond. She was full of cuts and bruises.

To protest the inhuman treatment, Ms. Gong held a hunger strike. However, she was brutally forced fed. They inserted a tube through her nose and she bled a lot and was in terrible pain. They put a laxative in the food, which caused her to have diarrhoea more than a dozen times a day. Wang Hongjing sexually harassed her several times in the hotel room. To conceal their crimes, the officials from the 610 Office did not let her husband visit until she recovered from her injuries. However, after she was transferred to the Pinggu Detention Centre, guard Hu Dongshan beat her and kicked her stomach, legs and head. Her right ankle was injured, but they still put handcuffs and shackles on her.

Since Ms. Gong still refused to give up practising Falun Gong, they reported that she was having psychiatric problems and sent her to the Hanzhuang Psychiatric Hospital. Ms. Gong managed to escape from the hospital. 610 Office agents searched everywhere for her, so she was unable to return home.

To defame Falun Gong and deceive the public, the officials from the Pinggu County 610 Office spread the lie that Ms. Gong had a mental disorder from practising Falun Gong. On October 9th, 2001, Ms. Gong published her article on the Minghui.org website entitled, “Are They Really Trying to 'Save' Me” Her articled detailed the inhumane torture she suffered. However, the officials from the 610 Office declared that she was spreading rumors and defaming the government. She was singled out as one of the persons on the list for close monitoring. Her husband, who works in the police department, was under a lot of pressure.

2. Physically and Mentally Tortured in Beijing Women's Prison

In 2001, Pinggu Police Department officers arrested Ms. Gong again. She was sentenced to four years in prison. From 2002 to 2003, she was incarcerated in the 3rd Division of Beijing Women's Prison where the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners was most severe. Since Ms. Gong refused to renounce Falun Gong, Tian Fengqing, the director of the 3rd Division, along with the inmates Li Xiaobing and Li Xiaomei, declared that she was possessed by spirits. Claiming that they were trying to save her, they brutally tortured her in a room without a CCTV monitoring device. More than a dozen people divided into three shifts took turns torturing her around the clock. They deprived her of sleep and kept talking or forced her to watch videos that defamed Falun Gong. She was not allowed to sit, use the restroom, or wash herself. She was forced to stand or squat during conversations and was forced to answer questions. To keep her awake, they often splashed cold water on her face or head, poked her with pens, and slapped and beat her. They wrote words that defamed Falun Gong on the floor and forced her to walk over them. They insulted and humiliated her. She suffered severely from not being allowed to use the toilet. Every time when she needed to use the toilet, they ordered her to renounce Falun Gong. She became incontinent. When she wet herself, she was not allowed to change her clothes. After a long time without bathing or changing clothes, she smelled very bad and suffered a lot. To protest the inhumane treatment, she held a hunger strike.

She suffered more than 40 days of sleep deprivation. When she was forced to stand in the dark hallway at night, her mind sometimes was not clear and she screamed in fear. The guards then declared that she had a psychiatric disorder and sent her to the psychiatric division for treatment, where she was forced to take drugs every day. They also shocked her with electric batons.

After six months in the psychiatric division, Ms. Gong talked and moved with slow reactions. However, her mind was clear and she knew that Falun Gong was good. She also treated people warmly. However, the guards put her in solitary confinement in a small cell for eight months where she was only given corn buns in small amounts. They tortured her every day using tactics that did not leave a trace. They forced her to put her legs into a full lotus position by binding them or pulled her legs apart into a split position. They had a medic on-site during the torture to check her heartbeat to ensure her life was not in danger. Once guards Xi Xuehui and Chen Jing tortured her in the bathroom where no CCTV was installed. They pulled her legs as far apart as they could. After that, Ms. Gong was unable to walk normally for a few months. Once a guard ordered an inmate to sit on her back and pulled her legs. The tendons in both legs were injured. In 2003 during the SARS outbreak, Chen Jing was rewarded by being allowed to become a community Party member for his brutality in the Falun Gong persecution.

At the end of 2003, the prison was supposed to move to a new facility where most rooms had CCTV installed. Before the move, Tian Fengqing and inmates took Ms. Gong to the confinement room to torture her. The inmates poked her with needles and tied her legs into the full lotus position with an inmate sitting on her back. They later pushed her head down to touch her feet and bound them up, and then pushed her under a stool. The stool was pushed up since it was so low, but they sat on it to torture her. When Ms. Gong still refused to give up her belief, they pulled her out and began to beat her. Her face was a mess from the beating and she had bruises around her eyes. She also limped.

In the beginning of 2004, Ms. Gong was transferred to the 8th Division, which was infamous for “transforming” [forcibly renounce Falun Gong] Falun Gong practitioners with hypocritical methods. The division director was Huang Qinghua at the time. In May 2004, because Ms. Gong openly testified that she was tortured in prison, Huang Qinghua treated her as an important target.

Huang observed Ms. Gong for a month and then put her in isolation. Except for the guards and the collaborators (former practitioners, brainwashed against Falun Gong, made to assist in brainwashing and torturing practitioners), she was not allowed to have contact with anyone else. They tried to destroy her psychologically with loneliness, fear, depression, and despair, and kept telling her she had mental problems. They told her if she continued practising Falun Gong, she would damage Falun Gong and destroy herself, her family, and her children. They forced her to watch the news and write reports every day. They insulted, cursed, and shouted at her so that she was under constant stress. At the same time, Huang pretended to care about Ms. Gong's health and family and brought her snacks to confuse her. When Ms. Gong was released in 2005, she was dull and moved slowly. Due to being deprived of toilet use, her bladder was injured. She sometimes had urinary incontinence. Her husband divorced her. Without a home or a job, she had to work temporary jobs to make a living, but her belief in Falun Gong never changed.

3. Sentenced to Forced Labour Again and Persecuted in the Wuhai City Women's Forced Labour Camp

In 2008, the police in Beijing arrested many practitioners with the excuse of safeguarding the Beijing Olympics. Ms. Gong was arrested again and sentenced to two years of forced labour. She was first detained in the Beijing Daxing Women's Forced Labour Camp. Afraid of an investigation from the international media, many Falun Gong practitioners were transferred to facilities outside Beijing. Ms. Gong was sent to the Wuhai City Women's Forced Labour Camp in Hubei Province. She was tortured and not allowed to use the toilet. When she soiled her pants, she was not allowed to change clothes, The camp guards often insulted and cursed her. Once, after she shouted “Falun Gong is good” she was hung up and shocked with electric batons. She was also force-fed several times and her stomach bled.

4. Arrested Again

After Ms. Gong was released in 2010, she returned to the Beijing area. In 2012, she worked in a private preschool in the Miyun District and lived temporarily in the facility. On August 29th, 2012, Henanzhai Police Station officers arrested her at work. They ransacked her room and confiscated her Falun Gong books and materials. She was handcuffed behind her back and stuffed into the trunk of a police car. They left the trunk open and one of her feet was hanging outside the trunk. She was detained in the Nihe Detention Centre in the Shunyi District. She was later sentenced to two years and nine months of forced labour. She is currently being detained in the Beijing Women's Forced Labour Camp.

Earlier report:

Are They Really Trying to "Save" Me? (http://en.minghui.org/emh/articles/2001/10/17/14768.html)