Shenyang Entrepreneur Arrested and Tortured for Practising Falun Gong

Once a successful entrepreneur who did international trade between China and Ukraine, a 47-year-old Shenyang man saw his livelihood crushed by the Chinese Communist Party's persecution of Falun Gong.

Mr. Ouyang Hongbo (欧阳洪波) was sentenced to three years in March 2007, just months after he began to practise Falun Gong. By the time he was released in 2010, he had lost his business. He moved back home to care for his 83-year-old father, only to be arrested again four years later.

Mr. Ouyang was arrested while visiting friends on July 16th this year. The police had been tracking him for months and knew with certainty that he'd be there. They tortured him savagely when he refused to inform on other practitioners. The injuries he sustained are still visible as he remains in Shenyang City Detention Centre.

The local procuratorate approved Mr. Ouyang's arrest on August 20th. The police confiscated items from his father's house and used them as evidence to fabricate charges against him. His father has hired a lawyer to defend him.

Details of Mr. Ouyang's Second Arrest

When Mr. Ouyang went to visit friends on July 16th, 2014, the police who were ransacking his friends’ apartment arrested him. They hit Mr. Ouyang in the face and back, and said that they had been looking for him. After locking him up in the police station, they went to his father’s residence to search for evidence to persecute him. They took away his printer, Falun Gong books, and other personal belongings.

The police told him that they had been secretly following him and knew that he would go to that residence. They hoped to use Mr. Ouyang to provide information that they could use to frame some of his Falun Gong friends, but Mr. Ouyang refused to comply.

The police made Mr. Ouyang take them to his rental house, searched it, arrested the two female tenants, and detained all three of them in the Jixian Local Police Station.

The basement in the Jixian Local Police Station is used by the Domestic Security Team of the Shenyang City Police Department to incarcerate and torture Falun Gong practitioners. Several officers took Mr. Ouyang to the basement toilet, turned off the surveillance camera, and began to hit him in the ribs, back, and knees. They stepped on and kicked his legs and poured cold water on him and into his nose. They tied his hands behind his back and hung him up, and then whipped him. Their goal was to force him to give information about other practitioners. When Mr. Ouyang was close to death, they let him down, soaked and shivering, and restrained him in an iron chair to let the wind blow on him, and threatened, “We’ll say you killed yourself if you die right now.”

The Domestic Security Team took Mr. Ouyang to the Shenyang City Detention Centre on July 17th. The guards brought him to a hospital on July 25th. Mr. Ouyang had bruises on his knees; his ribs still hurt; his right leg, back, and hands were numb; there were wounds on his left knee; his chest felt tight when he breathed; and there was a shadow seen on a lung X-ray.

Police Fabricate Charges against Mr. Ouyang

To charge him, the policemen from the Shenyang Police Department searched his father’s residence once again and took a raincoat and a motorbike. They claimed that Mr. Ouyang wore that particular raincoat to paint a “Falun Gong is good” banner and then rode his motorbike to hang it up. They tried to force him to admit that he was responsible for the banner. Mr. Ouyang told them that he respected the person who painted the banner, but it was not him.

The policemen had another “talk” with Mr. Ouyang on July 30th. They threatened to sentence him, whether he admitted to their fabricated story or not, and said that they would go back to his father’s residence to turn it upside down, and would even arrest his wife, too.

Mr. Ouyang is currently incarcerated in the Shenyang Detention Centre. His injuries are still very serious.

Parties involved in the persecution of Mr. Ouyang:

Jixian Local Police Station
Phone: 86-24-83991202, 86-24-23214354, 86-24-23514354
Liu Bo (刘波), chief: 86-24-15640556308
60 Eighth Street South, Shenyang, zip: 110000

Shenyang City Police Department:
106 Zhongshan Rd, Heping District, Shenyang City, zip: 110002
Phone: 86-24-23105090, 86-24-024-2310583
Xu Wenyou (许文有), chief director
Wang Xiaogang (王晓刚), deputy director: 86-15945698994 (mobile)
Sun Jianjun (孙建军), deputy director: 86-13609810669 (mobile)

Domestic Security Team of Shenyang City Police Department:
Phone: 86-24-23106023, 86-24-25850233

Shenyang City Detention Centre:
Gaoli Village, Zaohua Township, Yuhong District, Shenyang City, zip: 110148
Phone: 86-24-89241894, ext: 8084, 86-24-89248084
Zheng Gang (郑罡), head
Guo Baoan (郭宝安), deputy head
He Dongning (何冬宁), party head