Hebei Province Dafa Practitioner Ms. Jiang Suhua Dies from Injuries After Force Feeding

Ms. Jiang Suhua, was a 50 year old practitioner who lived in Chicheng County in Hebei province. She was jailed by the county government personnel on February 7, 2002, and died from injuries she incurred after being force fed. She was abused after a long hunger strike she held in support of her right to freedom of belief.

Ms. Jiang began practising Falun Gong in February of 1999. After beginning the practice, both her physical health and moral character improved tremendously. She was in excellent health and weighed 150 pounds.

In May of 2001, 21 practitioners in Chicheng County were jailed because they had gone to Beijing to appeal on behalf of Falun Dafa. To prevent the same thing from happening in Yangtian Township, the township government officials went to the village where known Falun Gong practitioners lived in order to force them to sign papers pledging not to practise Falun Gong.

On the morning of February 7, 2002, township police chief, Du Zhigang, local policeman, Mr. Li, township government staff member, Ding Xuejun, and various others swarmed into Ms. Jiang's house without any proper legal procedure. After they forced their way in, Du began searching Ms. Jiang's house. The rest went to other practitioners' houses, leaving only two others to watch Jiang. Du found a few Falun Dafa books and exercise tapes, and after a while he left as well.

At noon over twenty people came to Ms. Jiang's house, some were from the township government and some from the police department of the county. They dragged Ms. Jiang to a car parked outside and took her directly to the county police department, where they handcuffed her to a heating pipe. She was falsely accused later that day of committing the crime of "disturbing the order of the society" although was innocent of any crime and sent to the county detention centre for 15 days. That night in the detention centre no one bothered to provide her with any food. On her third day in the detention centre, she began a hunger strike as the only way she could bring attention to her unlawful detention. Her hunger strike was completely ignored by everyone because it occurred during the New Year's Day holiday. On the ninth day of her hunger strike, the detention staff force-fed her for the first time. Ordering three criminal inmates, two of them holding one arm each, and a third holding her legs, they dragged Ms. Jiang into a policeman's office. The jail doctor, Chu Xiuzhen, then inserted a meter-long plastic tube through her nose into her stomach, and used a plunger to inject milk power mixed with salt into her stomach. After the force-feeding, the criminal inmates were order to drag her back to her cell where they threw her on to the cement floor. Because her stomach had been empty for days, the force-feeding left her feeling quite nauseous and soon she vomited up everything in her stomach. The second time, the detention staff and doctor force-fed her after the13th day of her hunger strike. After the force feeding the inmates who were ordered to drag her back to her cell again threw her on the cement floor the same way they had done the first time. The two practitioners in the cell pleaded with the inmates to lift Ms. Jiang onto the bed, but the inmates just ignored the practitioners, turned away and locked the door behind them. Since one of the practitioners was on a hunger strike, the other had to expend a great effort to move Ms. Jiang onto the bed by her self. Afterwards the two practitioners tried to talk to her, but she did not reply. She made some attempt to eat a bit of milk power and some other food they fed her, but did not respond to anything said to her. The practitioners detained with her felt her condition was rather abnormal and called upon the police to verify her condition, but no one responded despite their repeated attempts to get her medical attention.

On the evening of February 24, which was the 16th day after Jiang began her hunger strike, the practitioners in the cell felt that her physical condition was deteriorating and was critical as she had been unconscious. They cried for the police to help, but no one responded. The next morning they tried again and still no one answered. At noon, the jail doctor Chu Xiuzhen went to the detention centre and examined Jiang after practitioners had informed her of the situation. After the examination she rushed Jiang immediately to the hospital and notified her family. The family members arrived at the county hospital only to find that Jiang was being transferred to the Zhangjiakou Hospital. At Zhangjiakou Hospital, they found that she was unable to lift one of her arms and could not speak. Four days later she died. Extremely saddened, her family took her body home. When they were preparing her body for the funeral at home, they found that on the back of her head there was a large swelling, on her lower back there was a big piece of flesh that had festered, and in her mouth there was coagulated blood.

Jiang's family had attempted to visit her many times while she was detained, but was turned away each time by the detention centre authorities. Her family had not seen her since the day she had been taken away from her home against her will, and thus had no knowledge whatsoever of her situation in the detention centre, let alone the fact that she was conducting a hunger strike or that she had been hospitalized. Her medical bills in the county hospital and Zhangjiakou Hospital, plus the transportation and the funeral expenses exceeded 14 thousand yuan. After her funeral, her family went to the township government to demand accountability and reimbursement for the medical expenses. The township government paid them three thousand yuan eventually in order to make the case disappear.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/2/24/68091.html