Detained and Tortured for Eleven Months, Ms. Yang Benhui Can Barely Move

Summary of Key Persecution Facts

Name: Yang Benhui

Gender: Female

Age: 30's
Address: Jiulongpo District, Chongqing

Occupation: Worker

Date of Most Recent Arrest: August 19th, 2012
Most recent place of detention: Huayan Detention Centre

City: Chongqing

Persecution Suffered: Detention, forced labour education, home ransacked, brutal beatings

On July 25th, 2013, Yang Benhui, a Chongqing Falun Gong practitioner had been detained for 11 months at Huayan Detention Centre in Jiulongpo District in Chongqing. Ms. Yang met with her lawyer from Beijing who'd been hired by her family.

Yang Benhui was brutally tortured during the detention period. Her two front teeth had been smashed out and her left hand could not lift anything. Also, she thought she was having a heart-attack and could barely move. Not wanting to be held responsible for her death, the detention centre sent Ms. Yang to the hospital on July 19th, 2013.

Unjust Sentencing in 2012

On August 19th, 2012, the Political and Legal Afairs Committee of Chongqing instructed the domestic security division in Jiulongpo District and Ba'nan District to unlawfully arrest 20 Falun Gong practitioners, including Yang Benhui, Wang Yun, Lixiang Dong and his wife Zhan Lanzhen, etc. After Li Xiangdong and his wife were arrested, Li's mother filed a complaint to the relevant departments, accusing the domestic security division in Jiulongpo and police station in Xiejiawan for unwarranted entry and illegal searching and detaining. The complaint was ignored so Li's mother hired a lawyer from Beijing to provide legal assistance to her son and daughter-in-law. After the lawyers arrived in Chongqing, the head of Jiulongpo Domestic Security Divisions were furious, and kept making trouble for the lawyer and Li's mother.

Yang Benhui, is an employee of South Station of Chongqing Railway Department. On May 27th, 2003, the police from Huangjueping Police Station in Jiulongpo District broke into Yang Benhui's house when she was not home without any legal procedures or documents. The police took away Yang Benhui's Falun Gong books. Around 7 people (including police and community committee members) took Yang Benhui out of her workplace without any warning or documents. The police brutally beat Yang Benhui on the street in front of her workplace. Yang Benhui was beaten black and blue and had severe internal injuries. Her private parts bled and discharged yellow pus. Paying no regard to her internal injuries Yang Benhui was detained by the police for 15 days.

In the Detention Centre, the police deceived Yang Benhui, saying that as long as she signed the release form, she could go home. But Ms. Yang did not know her rights and the police coerced her into signing a blank piece of paper. Then the police printed their content on the blank paper and used it to sentence Yang Benhui to one year in a labour camp.

Prior to this arrest, Yang Benhui was detained in Chongqing Women's Labour Camp on June 26th, 2004 where she suffered abuse.

Ms. Yang's work department is now planning to dismiss Yang Benhui. The trial of Li Xiangdong and Zhan Lanzhen will commence at the Baguocheng Court in Jiulongpo District. The 610 Office (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong) in Chongqing is planning to collaborate with the detention centre and manipulate this trial so that there will be no release for Yang Behui.