Head Nurse Cured of Cancer by Practising Falun Gong Tortured to Death for Not Giving It Up

It was Falun Gong that brought Ms. Shen Jing’e back from the brink of death.

Once diagnosed with breast cancer and lymphoma, she was given a new lease on life after she took up the practice, which restored her health.

In 1999, when the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) decided to ban Falun Gong, Ms. Shen was at a loss to understand why. She wanted people to know how Falun Gong had saved her life, so she went to Beijing to appeal to the government. She was imprisoned multiple times, subjected to an array of brutal and inhumane forms of tortures, and eventually died as a result.

Falun Gong Gives Her a New Life
Ms. Shen was formerly a head nurse at a major hospital in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province. She was a rising star with many opportunities before her. But her life took a turn for the worse in 1998 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer which spread to the lymph nodes.

She had her right breast and lymph nodes removed, but the cancer continued to spread. Her doctors predicted that she had only three months to live since there was nothing else they could do for her.

Near the end of the third month, she happened to see Falun Gong practitioners exercising in a park. She learned that Falun Gong was beneficial for both mental and physical health and decided to give it a try.

Gradually, she became stronger and eventually was completely cured. Her family was thrilled by her quick recovery and also amazed to have witnessed the healing power of Falun Gong.

Arrested and Tortured for Refusing to Renounce Falun Gong
Only a few months after she began to practice, however, the communist regime ordered the persecution of Falun Gong. Between 2000 and 2001, Ms. Shen was incarcerated multiple times and was brutally tortured each time.

She was detained and tortured in Bamiantong Detention Center in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province, in early 2000 for refusing to renounce Falun Gong.

She was handcuffed to a metal ring attached to the ground and was unable to move. She was also subjected to a “freezing torture” – in which the guards forced her and other practitioners to sit outside when it was snowing for over two hours to induce hypothermia.

She was incarcerated in Sidao Forced Labour Camp a few months later and shocked with electric batons. She joined other practitioners in reciting the Falun Gong teachings. To silence them, guards taped their mouths shut, beat them, and tied their hands and feet to chairs.

Their cell faced a male cell. When they did the standing exercises, the guards would strip off their pants and push them closer to the windows to expose their private parts to the male prisoners.

Guard Liu Xiufen also grabbed the nipples of a 60-year-old Falun Gong practitioner, while cursing and hurling foul language at the practitioners.

Ms. Shen was later released after she protested the persecution with a hunger strike.

Sentenced to Prison and Eventual Death
Ms. Shen was arrested at home in November 2001. The police pried open her apartment door, then dragged her downstairs into the police car.

She shouted for help. Her mother rushed to the police car to try to save her daughter, but the officers closed the door and started to drive away. Her mother grabbed the side mirror, trying to make them stop, but the driver refused to and just dragged her mother along. When the car finally did stop, a few officers pulled her mother’s hands off the mirror, threw her on the ground, and drove away.

In the detention centre, Ms. Shen was put on the heaviest shackles and handcuffs, then attached to the metal ring in the floor for more than 30 days. During the entire time, she was unable to move and had to relieve herself in her pants.

Torture illustration: Handcuffed and shackled to a metal ring in the floor

Ms. Shen was given a 3.5-year sentence and incarcerated in Harbin Women’s Prison in November 2002. The guards often hit her and ordered the other inmates to beat her. She became incontinent.

She was hung up with her hands cuffed behind her back, her toes barely touching the floor. Guards force-fed her after she began a hunger strike to protest how she and other practitioners were being treated. The torture damaged her internal organs, and she ended up having constant spasms. Her face looked as if she’d had a stroke. She was in excruciating pain.

Torture illustration: Hanging with both hands cuffed behind the back

Ms. Shen finally reached the limit of her endurance. As soon as she was hung up one day, she passed out and could not get up for over a month.

She became blind afterward, but the guards often made her stand near the vent inside the washroom all day long in winter to freeze her. As she stood there, she sang, “Across the mountains and rivers, I came here for you....”

Her song moved many inmates to tears.

After years of torture, Ms. Shen was finally released in May 2005. She was very frail and could only eat a small amount of food at a time. Her spirit and body were devastated, and she lived in fear that she could be arrested again. She became so weak that she could no longer sit up. She died on November 5, 2006, at the age of 45.

Brutality Beyond Imagination
Falun Gong practitioners were arbitrarily beaten by guards and prisoners in Harbin Women’s Prison. They were forbidden to buy basic necessities and prohibited from writing to their families.

Prisoners were pressured to collude with the guards to torture the practitioners and search them. Prisoners could also vent their frustrations on the practitioners at random. Those who tortured practitioners the most had their terms reduced and were rewarded with other incentives.

Cursing was forbidden by the prison administration, but prisoners utter profanities at practitioners all the time.

The average temperature in winter in Harbin is around 20 to 30 degrees Fahrenheit. Guards stripped practitioners of their jackets and pants, then dragged them outside in the snow and ice. Some prison districts left practitioners outside overnight.

Guards forced practitioners to sit on the floor for over 12 hours straight. They opened the windows and prohibited the practitioners from falling asleep.

Prisoners used toothpicks to pry open practitioners’ eyelids and shot water into their faces. Guards used two-meter long wooden clubs to hit practitioners if they closed their eyes. Practitioners were forced to relieve themselves in their pants because the guards prohibited them from using the restroom.

Torture reenactment: Using a toothpick to hold the eyelids open, preventing sleep

Guards encouraged the prisoners to jab practitioners’ genitals with wooden clubs. Some prisoners took off their own pants and exposed their private parts, forcing practitioners to smell them.

Guards in the 7th district took practitioners outside to freeze them or locked them up in rooms with no heat.

After a few days, some fell down and some fainted. Practitioners were also forced to sit on snow all night long. After freezing the practitioners, guards shocked the practitioners with high-voltage electric batons.

Guards in the 1 st district hung practitioners up, some for up to 7 times. Guards in the 7th district tortured practitioners with a method called “Su Qin Carrying a Sword” – the hands were twisted and handcuffed behind the back with one hand over the shoulder. They were then lifted up by ropes tied to the handcuffs.

A person can easily lose consciousness in about ten minutes after being hung like this, and the wrists can be fractured. However, many practitioners were hung like this for months at a time, during which they were forced to relieve themselves in their pants.

Witnessing how kind practitioners were despite how the guards and other inmates treated them, some prisoners began to learn Falun Gong. Liu Lingling was one of them.

She killed her husband and spent all her family’s money on herself. She often screamed and yelled filthy words. After studying the Falun Gong teachings, however, she changed for the better. She became remorseful for what she had done in the past.

“If I had practised Falun Gong earlier, I would not have killed and caused great harm to my husband’s family,” she said.

Nonetheless, guards beat her to force her to stop practising Falun Gong.

The deaths of the following practitioners after being tortured in Harbin Women’s Prison have been confirmed: Wang Ying, Wang Fang, Guo Meisong, Qu Jie, Sun Guirong, and Li Haiyan.

Other Practitioners Brutally Tortured in Harbin Women’s Prison
Below is a brief recap of the torture other practitioners have suffered in Harbin Women’s Prison.

Ms. Wang Jianping was beaten by prisoners with electric batons on her breasts, face, feet, and hands.

Ms. Guan Yingxin’s hands were cuffed behind her back and her eyelids were pried open with toothpicks. Guards injected water into her eyes and used bamboo boards to strike her feet.

Ms. Shang Xiufang’s pants were pulled off, and guards used large wooden clubs to strike her buttocks. Two of her toenails fell off.

Ms. Zhang Xiaobo was slapped in the face, not allowed to use the toilet, tied to the bottom of a bed board, and hung up.

Ms. Zhou Chunzhi fainted while being beaten. She convulsed and her chin slammed into bricks. Guards force-fed her psychiatric drugs, handcuffed her behind her back, then hung her up. When she sprained her waist, prisoners tied her up, held her down on the floor, and called it “treatment for back pain.”

Torture illustration: Handcuffed behind the back

Ms. Li Jingwei was beaten for an entire day. She could not remember how many male and female guards beat her until she collapsed.

Seven practitioners, including Ms. Shen, were handcuffed behind their backs for 24 hours.

Ms. Gao Xiuzhen was forced to wear a torture device and a prisoner put her hand into Ms. Gao’s vagina.

Ms. Wang Fang and Ms. Chen Weijun went on a hunger strike and were force-fed. The guards left the feeding tubes inserted in their stomachs. The prisoner who was told to remove the tubes said that the tubes were covered with mould at the time of extraction.

Both women later developed chest pain and began to cough. They were taken to the hospital. Doctors found that their lungs had been damaged by the tubes. Ms. Wang died six months later.

In May 2003, seven practitioners, including Ms. Shen, were hung up from the top bunk bed with their toes barely touching the floor for three days.

They were put down if they fainted, but hung up again when they regained consciousness. One of Ms. Shen’s arms was injured so severely that it was still swollen a year later. Prisoners even put dirty socks into a practitioner’s mouth after she passed out.

A practitioner was hung up and had her mouth taped because the guards suspected that she secretly visited Ms. Shen.

Guards in the 2nd district dragged 25 practitioners outside to freeze them. Eight days later, Ms. Yu Xiulan’s hands were frozen, but guards locked her up in a small confinement cell for an additional four months.

Guards colluded with prisoners to force-feed practitioners drugs and give them injections to prevent heart attacks and high blood pressure before torturing them. Not even death row prisoners are treated like this.