Falun Dafa Practitioner Ms. Liu Qingmei from Shandong Province Savagely Tortured for Her Belief

Falun Dafa practitioner Ms. Liu Qingmei is 49 years old, and lived at Daxiapo Village, Shidui Town, Anqiu City in Shandong Province. She started practising Falun Dafa in 1998. After Jiang Zemin's group launched a persecution and a smear campaign against the founder of Falun Dafa on July 20th, 1999, she went to Beijing many times to appeal for justice for Dafa. She was extorted of money, arrested and her home was ransacked. She was also savagely tortured and nearly killed.

Prior to beginning Dafa practice, Ms. Liu was inflicted with many illnesses, including chronic cholecystitis [gallbladder inflammation], gastritis [stomach inflammation] and duodenal ulcers, among other conditions. She tried Eastern and Western medicine, all to no avail. When these conditions became very serious she received IV infusions but could still not eliminate the excruciating pain. After Liu Qingmei encountered Dafa, she felt energetic and healthy again. Dafa gave her a new life. She practised Dafa with rock-solid determination.

Ms. Liu Qingmei went to Beijing for the first time on April 25th, 2000, but was intercepted at the Weifang Train Station and taken to the police station. The officers shocked her hands and feet with electric batons. Police officers from her native Anqiu City took her back and sent her to a custody centre where she met many other practitioners. They did the Dafa exercises together in a group. Guard Zhou shocked the practitioners' heads, necks, arms and legs with an electric baton and chained them to a staircase railing with their feet barely touching the ground. The torture lasted more than an hour. The practitioners then held an eight-day hunger strike to protest and were subsequently released.

Liu Qingmei went to Beijing again in May 2000 and was arrested and taken back by officers from Anqiu City Liaison Office in Beijing. The police extorted 4,300 yuan¹ from her family and frequently harassed the family at their home. Ms. Liu chose to go into exile to avoid further persecution. She joined several other Dafa practitioners who went to Beijing again in late 2000 to appeal. They were arrested at the Weifang Train Station. Cheng Shuping, head of the Anqiu City Politics and Security Section, handcuffed them and took them back to Anqiu City.

Police officer Li Shenghua interrogated practitioner Liu Qingmei. He handcuffed her and hit her with a broomstick until it fell apart. Liu Qingmei was held at a detention centre where she defied all of the guards' commands or orders in protest of the unjust detention. Deputy division head Ma Xiyan put a pair of 33-pound shackles on her ankles. These shackles are rarely used, even on death row inmates. Ms. Liu was tortured with these shackles for five days and five nights. The inmates saw that her hands and feet were swollen and begged the guards to unshackle her and release her handcuffs. The guards finally relented. Ms. Liu was extremely weak at this point, and the officials released her to avoid being held responsible.

Ms. Liu handed out leaflets exposing the persecution of Falun Gong in July 2001 among soldiers setting up communication cables west of Jiagexin Village. The soldiers gladly took the flyers, but the commander, brainwashed by Party propaganda, reported her to the Jiage Police Station. She was arrested and taken to the police station. The police demanded to know the source of the flyers, but Ms. Liu remained silent. Officer Jia Zaijun kicked her shoulders and then sent her to a detention centre where she was locked onto a metal chair. She went on a hunger strike, and the police, joined by nurses from a nearby hospital, ruthlessly force-fed her. Song Yunqing, the deputy police chief, purposely ordered the feeding tube to be left in place to prolong the irritation. During the feeding, the police ordered inmates to pull her hair back and hold her neck against the back of the chair, so her face turned toward the ceiling while she was at the same time handcuffed to the metal bars on both sides of the chair. She nearly suffocated, but the officials continued to torture her for more than an hour. The feeding was repeated for five days. Ms. Liu was left perilously ill with very high blood pressure and other severe symptoms. The officials eventually let her go home.

Officers from the Gaoxin Development Zone Police Department in Weifang City arrested Liu Qingmei at another Dafa practitioner's home in January 2002. The police tried to handcuff her in a "forced back-cuffing" position [This is a very painful form of torture in which one arm reaches down the back behind the head, and the other hand meets it from the lower back. The two hands are then handcuffed, to cause unbearable pain]. She thought, "I am a Dafa practitioner, and I did not violate any law. The police cannot persecute me." She protested, and five officers pinned her to the ground. They twisted her arms, pushed her head down and immobilized her legs with their knees. They struggled for a long time but still failed to handcuff her. Furious, they handcuffed her arms behind her back and also locked two other practitioners in metal chairs. The next day, police officers Li Shenghua and Jia Zaijun from Anqiu City put Ms. Liu and the other practitioner in a police car and drove them to the Anqiu Detention Centre. The detention centre refused to accept them because they were weak from torture. The police then handcuffed them in metal chairs in the detention centre office and ordered local police officers to monitor them. The practitioners went on a hunger strike to protest the arrest and detention. The guards ordered inmate Li Hongmin to force-feed them an unknown substance that caused vomiting in both practitioners. Officer Ren Zengcai from the Shidui Police Station slapped the practitioners' heads and faces, screaming, "I'll make you vomit!"

Two days later, the other practitioner was taken to a brainwashing centre. Officers from the Shidui Police Station sent Liu Qingmei to the Shidui Hospital for injections and force-feedings. She firmly resisted and pulled out the syringe and needle, requesting unconditional release. Officer Han Wenbin handcuffed Ms. Liu to the bed railings and hit her with a broom. Officers from the Shidui Police Station and from the Shidui Hospital gave her injections and force-fed her. Following the injections, Liu Qingmei felt horrible pain throughout her body. She struggled with all of her strength and eventually pulled out the needle. Han Wenbin whacked her buttocks and thighs with a large wooden board until those areas were black and blue. She could not turn over or move in bed due to the pain, which felt like being on pins and needles. The officials tortured Ms. Liu for 21 days, until she was barely alive. They released her but did not stop persecuting her. Yang Xudong, head of the police station, along with another officer harassed and intimidated Ms. Liu at home the very next day. She had to leave home to relieve pressure on her family again.

Liu Qingmei missed her child during her life in exile, so she went home on Sunday, September 26th, 2002. Han Wenbin and several other officers from the Shidui Police Station heard about it. They smashed the windows and broke into her home at 10:00 p.m. that same day, when Liu Qingmei and her daughter were asleep. They put Liu Qingmei in a police car. Han Wenbin told the driver to turn on the siren saying, "We'll arrest her openly and without any scruples." Li Jingbo, the former head of the Shidui Police Station who was later transferred to the Anqiu Custody Centre led several officers and ransacked Liu Qingmei's home.

The police couldn't find any money, so they tried to body-search Liu Qingmei who firmly resisted. The exasperated police handcuffed her and pushed her into a police car. They drove her to the Anqiu Detention Centre from the police station. During the trip, officer Li Shenghua screamed that he would bury Liu Qingmei alive, except that he had not yet located the perfect spot. They took her to the detention centre, but the authorities there refused to accept her because she was too weak from chronic abuse. Doctor Zhang Yuanting handcuffed Ms. Liu to a metal chair and ordered inmate Li Hongmin to force-feed her. Liu Qingmei was released after 21 days of torture when she was on the brink of death.

Li Shenghua and Jia Zaijun from the Anqiu 610 Office² led eight police officers and broke into a practitioner's residence at 8:00 p.m. on July 28th, 2002. They arrested the practitioners and Liu Qingmei who was staying there at the time and sent them to a detention centre. One practitioner among them was held for 35 days and released after the police extorted 5,000 yuan from her family. She was arrested again soon afterwards and sent to the Weifang Brainwashing Class for brainwashing. Another practitioner was held for more than 40 days. Her family could barely pool the extortion fee of 30,000 yuan, all of which they gave to the police. This practitioner also bought her way out of detention and was taken to a brainwashing class.

Liu Qingmei's family did not have money, so she was detained indefinitely. She held a hunger strike to protest. Doctor Zhang Yuanting ordered the inmates to beat her. Inmate Li Hongmin force-fed Ms. Liu three times a day and inserted a tube into her stomach three times a day. Doctor Zhang Yuanting even ordered the inmates to chew buns and stuff them into her mouth, to humiliate her. Six inmates gathered around the metal chair in which she was locked. They grabbed her hair, pinned her arms, pushed her neck against the back of the chair and tilted the chair backwards. They tried to pour water into her mouth and shove the chewed buns [steamed flour buns] into her mouth. She kept her mouth tightly closed. They put water and the chewed up buns down the feeding tube. She nearly choked to death. The same torture was repeated twice.

On one occasion she closed her lips, and guard Ma Xiyan pried her mouth open with a pair of handcuffs and viciously stabbed her gums with a hard object until her gums turned black. Ms. Liu's hunger strike lasted more than 20 days. Doctor Zhang Yuanting ordered inmate Li Hongmin to handcuff her arms behind her back, with a stick propping up the handcuffs, forcing her into a painful position around the clock. She had no choice but to lie face down at night. Her back and shoulders hurt so severely she could barely fall asleep. Other practitioners in the room saw her suffering. They sat up at night and helped her lean on them. She was handcuffed this way for nine days. Right after they removed the stick from the cuffs, they brought an illegal arrest warrant and ordered her to sign it. She said in a serious tone, "I did nothing wrong by practising Dafa! I will not sign it!"

After three months of detention prior to the 2003 Chinese New Year, Liu Qingmei said to detention centre division head Pan Qilu, "Let me go home unconditionally, because my daughter is waiting for me to spend the Chinese New Year with her!" Pan Qilu ordered guards to handcuff and shackle her. They locked her in a metal chair for five days until her legs and feet became severely swollen and she could not use the toilet. The guards finally let her out of the chair but still kept her in handcuffs and shackles. She had been held in a detention room for more than 20 days. She could not sit up due to the shackles, so she lay on the ground.

Eventually there was a trial. The guards carried her into the courtroom. She thought, "I am innocent, as I follow the law of the universe." She started explaining the facts of Falun Dafa loudly and clearly. When the chief justice asked her if she had anything else to say she said, "I request unconditional release."

Ten days later, a verdict reached the detention centre. Ms. Liu had been sentenced to 12 years in prison. When the officials told her to sign the verdict statement, she said, "It's not a crime to practise Dafa! It's not a crime to follow Truth, Compassion and Tolerance! I absolutely will not sign it!" A guard said, "It's effective even without your signature!"

The Communist Party has turned the law into a club and uses it to strike innocent people. Twenty days later, detention centre head Pan Qilu, doctor Zhang Yuanting and guard You Fang took Liu Qingmei to Jinan City Women's Prison. She had dangerously high blood pressure after more than 160 days of ill treatment, and the prison authorities refused to accept her. The police sent her home.

Officers from Shidui Town Police Station and Daxiapo Village Party secretary Han Huiwen went to Liu Qingmei's home at 9:00 p.m. one day in March 2004. They tried to get her to open the door. She refused and successfully escaped. The following day agents from the the police and town government dispatched three vehicles carrying 19 officials. They surrounded her home. They climbed into her yard when no one was home, broke the lock and ransacked the home. Four days later they ransacked her home again in broad daylight and took everything -- including food, clothes and anything else they could take with them. They even rummaged through a pile of dirt in the yard used to cover turnips. Liu Qingmei again chose to go into exile, but returned some time later.

Ms. Liu was arrested again at dusk on July 13th, 2006 when washing her hair at home. She was taken to a detention centre where she held a hunger strike. Doctor Zhang Yuanting ordered inmates handcuff her to a metal chair and force-feed her. He left the tube in place and taped a portion of the tube protruding from her mouth to her head. She used her knees to scrape the tube off. Inmate Fu Yuhang re-inserted the tube. He accidentally poked the tube into her trachea [windpipe] and nearly suffocated her. She was handcuffed in the chair for three days, and her hands, legs and feet became badly swollen. The doctor finally let her out of the chair but handcuffed her arms behind her back. Two weeks later doctor Zhang Yuanting, and guards Liu Xiuxia and Meng Fanli took Ms. Liu to the Jinan Women's Prison. She had been healthy through Dafa practice, but the persecution caused her to suffer relapses of her old illnesses, adding new health problems, such as high blood pressure and coronary heart disease. The prison authorities again refused to accept her. The guards took Ms. Liu home when they realised her life was in danger.

Contact information for officials responsible for Liu Qingmei's persecution:

Zhang Yuanting, prison doctor: 86-536-4261032 (home)
Wang Ziqing: 86-536-4396617 (office), 86-536-4228659 (home), 86-13963631535 (mobile)
Li Shenghua: 86-536-4368610 (office), 86-536-4370288 (home), 86-13805362626 (mobile)
Song Yunqing, deputy head of Jiage Police Station: 86-536-4383905 (office), 86-536-4266618 (home), 86-13706469257(mobile)
Shidui Police Station: 86-536-4700024
Head of Shidui Police Station: 86-13964750199 (mobile)
Party secretary from Daxiapo Village, Shidui Town: 86-536-4705397
Head of Daxiapo Village, Shidui Town: 86-536-4705570

Note

1. "Yuan" is the Chinese currency; 500 yuan is equal to the average monthly income of an urban worker in China.

2. "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://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2007/5/30/155877.html