How I Was Tortured by Government Officers in Shibu Town of Shandong Province

My name is Mr. Yu Shenghe, and I started to practise Falun Gong in December 1997. I used to suffer from many serious illnesses, including gastric ulcers, nephritis, and cardiac arrhythmias, but I quickly regained my health, since I started to practise Falun Gong, and I also improved spiritually.

On July 20, 1999, Jiang Zemin launched his illegal nation-wide suppression of Falun Gong. On December 28, 1999 (lunar calendar), I went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. On the 29th, I was unlawfully arrested at Tiananmen Square. I was detained in Changyi for 15 days and then transferred to Shibu Town, where I was kept in custody at the "Family Planning Office", which is in fact a prison to jail Falun Dafa practitioners.

On January 20, 2004 (lunar calendar), as soon as I was taken to the "Family Planning Office", the director Ming Zhaojiang, (who has by now been promoted to the "610 Office" in Changyi City), asked me to stand straight against the wall. He smelled of wine at the time and he slapped me repeatedly in the face until his hand started to hurt and became bruised. He then heated a metal poker in the stove until it turned red. He waved it in front of my face but did not dare to burn me. He then picked up a small metal coal shovel and hit me in the face with it, using all his strength. My cheeks became swollen right away but he used it again to beat me on my forehead. My forehead, my eyes, and my whole face were swollen and bruised. The other people present could no longer bear to look at me.

When Ming Zhaojiang finally got tired of beating me, he phoned Wei Tiankui, who is in charge of propaganda in the town and asked him to come over. Although it was below -- 100 Celsius, Wei forced me to take off my outer clothes. I was forced to stand in the yard, with only a thin layer of clothes and my hands raised above my head, holding an approximately fifty pound piece of coal. To make it more painful, they put a couple of stone wedges under my feet and I had to stand there for over two hours.

On March 21, 2000, Gong Zhiqiang and Wei Tiankui called me into a small room on the second floor of the "Family Planning Office" building while one of my relatives was visiting. They asked me, "Do you still practise Falun Gong?" When I replied, "yes", he knocked me to the ground and brutally kicked me in front of my relative. When they got tired of this, they asked me to take my clothes off again. I was forced to stand barefoot and in only my underwear on top of the building while holding a basin filled with water above my head. Gong Zhiqiang whipped me cruelly on my body and head with an electric wire. Blood permeated my underwear. My face and neck were drenched in blood. I looked badly mangled. He did not stop until his pager rang. After that, Wei Tiankui asked me to crawl on the ground. He whipped me on my body and feet with my belt until the belt was shredded. I was not able to lie down to sleep for three nights and my underwear couldn't be removed because all the blood caused it to stick to my body.

On April 10, 2000, Gong Zhiqiang and Wei Tiankui, were instructed by Guo Guanglin, the local Party Secretary, and Li Chunsheng, the bailiff, to come to the "Family Planning Office" again. They asked practitioners Li Xiufen, Lin Yongshun and Wang Lizhen to the top of the building, and forced them to walk while squatting down and holding a big piece of wood overhead. A basin containing chunks of concrete weighing up to 60 pounds was put on Lin Yongshun's head. They used needles to prick Li Xiufen's head and feet. After they had tortured the practitioners for a while, they asked them if they still practised Falun Gong, and the practitioners answered "yes." Then the three practitioners were hung on metal ladders, and their hands tied with electric wire. Only the tips of their feet were still touching the ground. They hung there for a whole day. When they were eventually freed from their ties, the electric wires had cut into their flesh and their wrists were bleeding.

At around nine o'clock in the evening, after Gong and Wei had drunk some wine, they came back to the "Family Planning Office" and kicked all eight practitioners out of their rooms. At the time, we were all in our underwear and bare footed. We were ordered to kneel in the yard. Gong Zhiqiang and Wei Tiankui violently kicked us in the ribs from two sides. I was rolling back and forth on the ground back and forth and gasped for breath for a long time.

In addition, Gong Zhiqiang stepped on my temples with his heel and on Wang Lizhen's fingers. Just then, I heard somebody else who had come with Gong and Wei, shouting loudly, "Stop! Stop! You will kill them." However, he realised that he could not stop them, and left in a hurry. The other two kept beating us, saying, "According to the higher-ups, there is no limit to what we may do to Falun Gong practitioners. Whatever we do, it will be okay, as long as they stay alive." Then Wei Tiankui forced me to crawl on my knees and elbows, from the bottom of the stairs to the top of the building. He kicked me at every step and there were 49 steps in all. On the third floor, there was a vertical iron ladder. He asked me to grab the ladder with my hands. He pulled my undershirt over my shoulders and my underpants below my knees. He then pricked me about ten times on the waist with a big needle. Then he whipped my genitals brutally using a small belt. He forced me to keep crawling. When I almost reached the top of the ladder, he asked me to hang on by both hands with my feet suspended in the air. When I could not hold on any longer, he pulled on my feet with a small belt. I took an about three-meter fall. This was repeated about six more times. He then forced me to raise a piece of concrete weighing about 60 pounds, and made me move to the bottom of the stairs in a squat, while holding the concrete on my head. I was then forced to kneel in the yard again with the concrete on my head. The same thing was done to Ms. Li Xiufen and my wife Qu Xiuhua. My wife fell from the stairs and lost consciousness. The next day, I could not get up because of the pain and because my chest was black and bruised. However, they still forced me to clean the streets along the government compound of the town. I had to walk with the help of a wooden stick.

On the evening of June 5, Gong Zhiqiang and Wei Tiankui called me to the yard after they had been drinking wine. They asked me, if Falun Gong was a cult. When I answered, "no", they forced me to remove all my clothes. Gong Zhiqiang grabbed my leather belt and started to beat me with it. At first, he beat me on the head and neck. Then, he held it at the other end and beat me with the buckle. When it descended on my chest and belly, I lost my breath, and felt as if my belly was split open. I fell on the ground. Yet, he still kept swearing at me, saying that I only pretended to be dead. He forced me upright and whipped me again.

On March 25, 2001, around 7:00 pm, the head of the local police substation, Jiang Yanmin, with six policemen in two vehicles came to my home (after my release) on the orders of Guo Guanglin and Li Chunsheng. As soon as they arrived at my home, Jiang Yanmin asked for my money and my bankbook, as well as for the keys to the desks in the room. I refused to give them to him. He therefore instructed police officer Li to pry open the drawers of three desks. Jiang Yanmin took one of the bankbooks, while police officer Chu Jianguo put forty yuan into his own pocket. They also took one colour TV set, one tape recorder, one sound system, one radio, one motorcycle, one refrigerator, and one (cash) bill counter, without justification. They even grabbed two new maps, one of my son's games and a pen.

On December 24, 2001, I was arrested by the "610 Office" (1) for distributing printed matter explaining the truth about Falun Gong, while it was snowing hard. Chen X, director of the Politics & Security Section of the local Public Security Bureau, Jiang Yanmin, and several local policemen, more than ten people in all, broke into my home and abducted me. I had my hands cuffed from the back to a metal chair in the town's police substation. They took my keys away from me. Then several people blindfolded me and started to shock my armpits with electric batons. They viciously beat me in the ribs from both sides with wooden sticks.

That afternoon, they searched my home again and took away a big colour TV set and DVD player that my son bought for his wedding. Jiang Yanmin took all of our bankbooks, one of which carried savings of 20,000 yuan, due that day. I had not set a secret pass code to protect the savings account. Jiang Yanmin immediately asked Yin X and Qu Jiantao to withdraw the money from the bank. Then, my wife and I were unlawfully taken to the municipal public security bureau. I was illegally detained for a month and my wife was detained for half a month. In detention, Chen X phoned my son and made threats extorting 10,000 yuan from him.

Since July 20, 1999, I have been wrongfully detained twice, and taken to the brainwashing classes in Changle Forced Labour Camp and Weifang. In the brainwashing classes, they did not allow me to sleep several days and nights in a row. I was subjected to extreme physical and spiritual torture. I was kept in custody in the local police substation during three Chinese New Year holidays, unable to get together with my family. 45,000 yuan have been extorted from me and my personal belongings valued at more than 5,000 yuan were confiscated. I have been jailed for a total of more than one year, thus being deprived of my personal freedom, my ability to run my business, and a normal life with my family members. My parents, children, relatives and friends have also suffered from the persecution, constantly living in terror.

Wei Tiankui, 86-536-7708009 (Home), 86-13963677358 (Cell);

Note:

(1) "610 Office", 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://minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/7/20/79846.html