Facts about the Persecution of Ms. Zhang Shoufeng in Zhejiang Province Women's Prison Over the Course of Almost Three Years

Falun Dafa practitioner Ms. Zhang Shoufeng has been persecuted in Zhejiang Province Women's Prison for close to three years. Ms. Zhang was arrested in Wenzhou and persecuted for three months. In the middle of November 2003, she was sentenced to serve a five-year prison term. During these proceedings, no one was allowed to visit her, and even her husband was only able to see her once at the hearing.

Zhang Shoufeng was employed by the East Steam Company in Shiyan City, Hubei Province, as an inspection commission secretary. After the persecution of Falun Dafa began, she was forced to resign from her position. In November of 2000, she travelled to Beijing with another practitioner to speak out on behalf of Falun Dafa. They succeeded in unfurling a banner that read "Falun Dafa Is Good" in Tiananmen Square, and they were subsequently detained. Later they were sent back to Shiyan City and imprisoned in the Shiyan City First Detention Centre. After a month, she was sent to the Dongyue Branch of the East Bus Company Police Department in Shiyan City to undergo "re-education" and forced brainwashing. After another two months of brainwashing she was taken to Shiyan's Second Detention Centre, where she underwent further persecution for another month.

When the brainwashing, detention, and other methods of persecution failed to achieved their desired results, Chinese Communist Party officials sent her to a 'special "transformation¹"' department. Inside the special "transformation" unit all imprisoned practitioners took to hunger strikes for seven days to protest the brutal persecution. The Dongyue police bullied Ms. Zhang Shoufeng's family and her husband, a non-practitioner, to get her to give up the hunger strike. They told the family that they would release her if she broke her fast, but that she would continue to be persecuted if she did not. Ms. Zhang firmly refused to comply. She would have agreed to break her fast at home if she was released. Only after her husband was forced to write a letter of "guarantee²" and supervision was she released.

Later, Zhang Shoufeng returned to Huangmei, her native village. 610 Office³ agents from the East Bus Company continued to secretly follow her. They monitored her telephone and continued to harass her, and placed her under house arrest.

In September of 2001, Zhang Shoufeng returned to Shiyan. In October, the city of Shiyan was flooded with Falun Dafa leaflets exposing the persecution. Eight police officers, including Guan Zhijun, Luo, and others from the Fifth Criminal Police Team of Dongyue Sub-bureau, burst into Ms. Zhang's home, took her away, and brought her to the Fifth Division Criminal Police Team. The police interrogated her for seven days and nights, and used sleep deprivation to force her to reveal the source of the leaflets. She was later transferred to Shiyan City First Detention Centre and persecuted for more than 40 days.

Zhang Shoufang was imprisoned at Dongyue Sub-bureau's third floor office. Special guards were designated to brainwash her. They also threatened to send her to Shayang Forced Labour Camp for re-education. Zhang Shoufeng adamantly resisted the persecution. Around the end of November, she escaped from the detention room through the window. She is now destitute and homeless.

In September 2002 once again, the police from Huangmei County burst into the home of a fellow practitioner, where Zhang Shoufeng was taking refuge temporarily. Ms. Zhang was forced to flee and move from place to place to avoid arrest for the second time.

At the end of 2002, Ms. Zhang was reunited with her family in Jiujiang in a rented house. In February 2003, she went to Wenzhou City in Zhejiang Province with her husband to work.

On August 30th, 2003, Zhang Shoufeng was arrested by five police officers in the Wenzhou City Development District while posting leaflets exposing the persecution. While on patrol, these men had followed her secretly. She was taken into custody and persecuted for more than three months. She was given a heavy sentence around mid-November of 2003. She was later transferred to Putaopeng Detention Centre in Zhejiang Province for an additional seven months, followed by a transfer to the Zhejiang Province Women's Prison. She remains there to this day.

Note

1. "Reform or Transform" Implementation of brainwashing and torture in order to force a practitioner to renounce Falun Gong. (Variations: "reform", "transform", "reformed", "reforming", "transformed", "transforming", and "transformation")

2. "Guarantee Statement": A statement to declare that one is remorseful for practising Falun Gong and guarantees not to practise Falun Gong again, not to go to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong, and never again associate with any Falun Dafa practitioners.

3. "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/2007/8/17/161009.html