Despicable Acts Towards Hebei Province Dafa Practitioner Mr. Xu Junshan

Falun Dafa practitioner Mr. Xu Junshan, 59, from Xingtai City in Hebei Province, lived at the employees' dormitory of the Xingtai Auto Factory. He started practising Falun Gong in 1996. After July 20, 1999, the Xingtai police harassed Junshan in various ways, including searching and ransacking his home, abducting his family members, torturing him, and extorting money from him and his family.

Xu Junshan went to Beijing to appeal against the persecution of Falun Gong on June 24, 2000. He was abducted even before reaching the Appeals Office, and was detained overnight at the Hebei Province Government Liaison Office in Beijing. Later, he was taken back by the Xingtai Public Security Bureau and detained for another five days at the Qiaodong Xiangyang Police Station in Xingtai City. During his detention, Mr. Xu was not allowed to sleep for 24 hours, and seven to eight police officers surrounded him and took turns beating him. On July 1, 2000, Mr. Xu was transferred to the No.1 Detention Centre in Xingtai City and was subjected to further detention and ill treatment for two months. He was finally released after the police extorted 1,300 yuan from him [500 yuan is the average monthly income for an urban worker in China].

At the beginning of March, in order to expose the slander and lies against Dafa by the Jiang regime, and to let people learn the truth about the brutal persecution of Dafa, Xu Junshan began printing and copying truth clarifying flyers and pamphlets.

On April 13, 2001, Detective Department Director Li, Detective Section Head Xu and others from the Xingtai Public Security Bureau went to Xu Junshan's home. They ransacked his house and took away his address book, diary, notes and photos. They also took him to the Factory Police Station. Accompanied by the police chief, Director Li interrogated Junshan. Without any evidence against him, they detained Junshan for three and a half days. During this time, Li and Xu used all kinds of horrible methods to torture Junshan with handcuffs. 1) They pulled one of his hands over his shoulder and handcuffed it to the other hand behind his back. 2) They handcuffed both of his hands and raised them until his feet could not touch the ground. 3) They handcuffed both of his hands to the pipe of a heater so that he could not stand up straight but could only squat down. 4) They handcuffed him with his back to the heater pipe so that he could neither stand nor sit down. These deputies laughed when they saw that Junshan was in pain. They did not allow Junshan to go to the toilet for more than ten hours, so he had to urinate in his pants. They tortured Junshan for five and a half days like this. Finally, after extorting another 300 yuan from Junshan's daughter they released Junshan around 5 p.m. on April 18, 2001.

On April 19 and April 22, 2001, Section Chief Bai of the Xingtai Public Security Bureau, accompanied by a Special Case Investigation Group staff member, harassed Junshan's household again. Junshan stood his ground, and barely avoided once again being abducted..

On the morning of April 27, 2001, the Xingtai Public Security Bureau and the Special Case Investigation Group again came to Junshan's home. This time they did not find him at home. Not satisfied, they abducted his daughter as a hostage, even though neither Junshan's son nor daughter practised Falun Gong. Junshan's wife had to ask people who had connections with the police to secure the release of their daughter after more than two days of detention and another 1,000 yuan in extortion fees. But the harassment did not end there. Junshan's wife was also abducted and brought to the Xingtai Detention Centre as a hostage. She was detained and tortured for nearly a month. She was released only after she was tortured to the point where she could no longer take care of herself and was near death. Again, the police extorted another 300 yuan from the family before releasing her.

Due to the constant harassment by the police, Junshan was forced to live away from home. He returned home around 10 a.m. on October 24, 2001. Not long after he arrived, Detective Section Head Xu and several police officers broke into his home. They did not show any warrant or legal documents. They forcefully handcuffed Junshan after beating him and ransacking his home again. During these uncontrolled acts of violence, his head hit a bed frame. Four of his front teeth were broken and his mouth was filled with blood. Junshan questioned them sternly, "How could you just break into someone's home in broad daylight? You are meant to be enforcing the law, yet you are knowingly violating it." Section Head Xu replied, "We are hooligans, so what can you do about it?" Junshan then shouted out loud, "Public Security is torturing and abducting good citizens!" Seeing people gathering around to see what was going on, several policemen quickly pushed and kicked Junshan into the waiting squad car, and sped off. Junshan was detained for half a month at a detention centre. Later, they transferred him to a guesthouse owned by the Mining Bureau. It was a place used by the Special Case Investigation Group, whose sole task was to persecute Falun Gong practitioners.

The Special Case Investigation Group was an organization formed by a gang of thugs from the Xingtai Public Security Bureau and the Qiaoxi Public Security Bureau branch office. This organization was formed specifically to torture and persecute Falun Gong practitioners, and was active from the latter half of 2000 to the end of 2001. Several hundred practitioners were tortured and harassed at this place. Each night the screams of torture victims could be heard. The only way to secure the release of a Dafa practitioner was by using money or a connection with the police as leverage. The minimum payment would be 5,000 yuan. There were numerous extortions exceeding tens of thousands of yuan. In less than one year's time the Special Case Investigation Group deputies extorted several million yuan from Falun Gong practitioners and their family members and friends. Even ordinary citizens were affected -- staff of the printing and photocopying shops that serviced Dafa practitioners could easily get their shops closed, their equipment confiscated, and be fined tens of thousands of yuan. Even people who talked about or expressed their sympathy towards Falun Gong could not escape persecution, as phone calls were monitored. All the money was illicitly divided among the deputies themselves. Practitioners who had no money would be brutally tortured and forced to admit that they were responsible for distributing flyers. The deputies would then use these individual cases to forge falsified reports to be handed to higher authorities, touting their "accomplishments" so they would receive bigger bonuses and awards. Hebei Province Public Security Bureau Office even awarded a first class commendation to the Xingtai Qiaoxi Public Security Bureau branch. The head of the Special Case Investigation Group, Wei Jikao, got a personal bonus of tens of thousands of yuan. Since he has personally tortured many Dafa practitioners, his name is on the Fawanghuihui list [a website that tracks the information of persecutors of Falun Gong practitioners].

Agents from the Special Case Investigation Group started torturing Junshan the very afternoon he was abducted and brought to the guesthouse. Deputy Bai Hongzhen handcuffed all four of Junshan's limbs to an iron chair, and secured his back with an iron bar. Junshan could not move at all. Then Bai Hongzhen inserted an electric baton into Junshan's mouth and turned on the switch. The crackles of sparks could be heard in his mouth. Later, Bai shocked Junshan's ears, hands, shoulders, knees and inner thighs. Bearing the extreme pain, Junshan told Bai Hongzhen, "It is wrong for you to persecute Falun Gong. All Falun Gong practitioners are good people. It is not good for you to torture good people." Bai Hongzhen yelled in reply, "I like to beat up good people! What's wrong with that?" He unlocked Junshan from the chair and knocked him to the ground. He put the iron chair on top of Junshan's back, sat on it, and started shocking Junshan again, especially on his sensitive areas. He told Junshan while shocking him, "Don't think I will ever go easy on an old man like you." Junshan replied, "I know a person can do all kinds of horrible and despicable acts once he loses his conscience."

At this point, Wei Jikao, who was watching Junshan being tortured, walked over and handcuffed Junshan back to the chair again. He then took a three-foot long stick and hit Junshan on the back using all his might. The wooden stick broke in half on the spot. Wei Jikao then started lashing him on his head and back with a leather belt until Junshan started bleeding from wounds on his head and body. Wei Jikao stopped only after Junshan went into convulsions and passed out.

Wei Jikao later tried to force Junshan to falsely testify against another Dafa practitioner who had gathered evidence of the extortion of money from Dafa practitioners by Wei Jikao and publicized his crime on Clearwisdom.net. Junshan refused to cooperate. Wei Jikao tried to force Junshan to sign repentance papers by threatening Junshan that his son would be fired from his job (Junshan's son was a driver for one of the Xingtai City Public Security Bureau's senior administrators). Again Junshan refused. After a few days Junshan's son was indeed fired from his job. During this period Junshan's wife was again abducted and taken to the same detention centre, under the pretext that she was needed as an "eyewitness." She was detained for five days, and was released only after they extorted another 3,000-yuan from her -- the "eyewitness" fee.

Wei Jikao and several deputies fabricated a report and sent it to their senior officials. Under coercion from the Xingtai City "610 Office"* and the Public Security Bureau, the Qiaodong People's Court and Prosecutor's Office finally filed charges against Xu Junshan in May 2002. Junshan noticed that the report material was totally fabricated, and that the signature was not even his. He questioned the prosecutors but his plea was ignored. In July 2002 the Qiaodong People's Court sentenced Junshan to 15 years in prison. On October 22, 2002, deputies from the Xingtai Intermediate Court, including Chief Prosecutor Wang Shuangmei, and prosecutors Guo Zhenqi and Zhang Qiuxu, handed down the decision that Junshan's original sentence would be maintained, and they prohibited Junshan from appealing again. Their decision and the relevant legal documents were not publicized, so even Junshan's own family did not know about the ruling. On the morning of October 23, 2002, the authorities secretly transferred Junshan to Tangzhuang Prison. On October 24, he was then transferred to the Shijiazhuang 4th Prison. In this prison, Xu Junshan and many other Dafa practitioners are subjected to even more brutal physical and mental torture.

Xingtai City Public Security Bureau, main number: 86-319-2022253

Xingtai City Qiaodong PSB branch: 86-319-3098041

Xingtai City Qiaoxi PSB branch chief office: 86-319-2059937

Xingtai City Qiaoxi PSB branch: 86-319-2071343 or 2023028

Wei Jikao: 86-319-2369006

Xingtai City Intermediate People's Court Office: 86-319-2051460

Xingtai City Qiaodong People's Court Office: 86-319-3181345

Xingtai City Qiaodong Prosecutor's Office: 86-319-3036450

Xingtai County Public Security Bureau: 86-319-3890575

(This article was based on Junshan's original document written at the prison).

* The "610 Office" is an agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute power over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2003/12/22/63056.html