I Was Imprisoned Four Times and Incarcerated for Seven Years

Since my release from a forced labour camp on May 15th, 2006, I have always conducted myself as a practitioner. Because of my convictions, I was arrested four times and imprisoned for seven years, in violation of the Chinese constitution. I explain the persecution truth to everyone I meet. My supervisors would tell me in the beginning, "As for your experiences in prison, just keep them between you and me. Do not tell others at work." I think, however, that I must explain the truth about the persecution of Falun Gong to everyone, so I tell everyone in my office about it.

I Was Known As "172" the First Time I Was Incarcerated

I was arrested for the first time on December 30th, 2000, when I was appealing for Falun Gong at Tiananmen Square. Police sent a huge group of arrested practitioners, including me, to Liaoning Province early the next morning. I was allocated for incarceration in Jinzhou City in Liaoning Province. It snowed heavily during the night, with accumulations of more than a foot. While in that prison, my assigned number was 172. I was unconditionally released on August 13th, 2001.

I later found out that 720 Falun Gong practitioners were sent to Liaoning Province that day. We were sent to 14 different cities, 50 practitioners to each city. Practitioners who were arrested in Beijing would usually be sent to their hometowns, but all of us refused to reveal our names and hometowns.

Because I practised the exercises in the prison cell I was savagely beaten, to the extent that I blood ran down my face. The guards poured cold water on me and forced me to sleep outdoors on the ground without any bedding when it was -32.8 Fahrenheit. I was subjected to "handcuffing behind the back" and "locked in solitary confinement." The inmates all witnessed my suffering. When the guards came and asked me whether I would continue to practise Falun Gong, I didn't even turn to look at them. The other inmates yelled out at the same time, "Can't you just tell them you will give up your practice?" I told them, "Falun Gong requires us to be noble cultivators. How can I give in?"

When the guards finally opened my handcuffs they contained rotted flesh. The swelling in my arms did not subside until several months later, and it took more than a year for the rust that the handcuffs had left on my wrists to fade away. At that time I had started a hunger strike. Everyone thought I would be sentenced to a prison term and sent to another prison or labour camp. The guards also told me to pack up and prepare for long-term imprisonment. However, as I carried my two pieces of baggage and walked to the gate, a car that had arrived to pick me up transported me to the Jinzhou City Train Station and the driver told me to get out.

That was the first incarceration I had ever endured. It was between December 30th, 2000, and August 13th, 2001.

The Second Incarceration

On October 25th, 2001, I went to Tiananmen Square again and unfurled a banner that read, "Falun Dafa Is a Righteous Practice" on one side and "Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance Is the Universal Law" on the other side. Police officers arrested me and held me in the Haidian District Detention Centre. They bound me to a chair and shocked me with four electric batons. They shocked me for several days; one of the batons broke, and another baton shocked the police instead. In the end there was only one baton left. They continued to shock me with that baton for several dozen days. I lost consciousness every 20 minutes. As soon as I regained consciousness they immediately shocked me again. There was burned flesh and scars all over my body.

Later I was sentenced to one and a half years of forced labour. I refused to sign the document. They told me, "It makes no difference whether or not you sign." I replied, "It's your habitual practice to neglect rules of law. What's the need to do these superficial things? However, I do not agree with the sentence, and I will appeal. It is my legal right to do so!"

Within a few hours, they then rushed me to the Beijing Forced Labour Detainee Dispatch Centre, where I declared I would appeal.

Agents at the dispatch centre dragged me out to beat me. I explained to them the rules of law and the legal consequences as they were beating me.

In addition to beating me, the police kept me from sleeping for two days. I was forced to perform labour during the day and I was forbidden to sit down while I worked. They also told me I had to outperform to be eligible to appeal.

The work they made me do was packaging chopsticks, which I had never done before. I was ordered to put 8,500 pairs of chopsticks into paper holders each day, package them together, and get them into cartons. On the third night I was still not allowed to sleep. I told the guards, "I didn't sleep the first two nights, just to show my respect for you. However, your conduct proves that you are not worthy of respect. I will go to sleep tonight. It is my legal right. I do not allow anyone to come interrupt my sleep!" Then I went back to my cell and slept on the bed. All the guards looked at me dumbfounded, but none of them dared to come in to make trouble. However, the head persecutor beat me again the next day.

After two months' stay at the dispatch centre I was sent to Beijing Women's Forced Labour Camp. The dispatch centre authorities impounded my notes and the poems I had written.

On one occasion I heard that supervisors from the Beijing Bureau of Re-education through Forced Labour would come to monitor a legal exam. I prepared some materials and submitted them to the person who came to monitor examinees. I wrote, "I am a Chinese citizen. According to the constitution, Chinese citizens have the freedom to write. It is my legal right to write poems." After several months, the poems I wrote were finally returned to me. By the time I was released from the labour camp, I had a collection of five books of poems.

The Third Incarceration

I was arrested for the third time when someone reported me for giving others leaflets exposing the persecution to read in a lift. I continued to explain the truth about the persecution in the police station. Even the police officer was moved. He said to me, "If my superiors don't make trouble for you, I will let you go home."

Later the arbitrator decided to hold me in detention for 15 days. I practised the exercises and explained the facts of the persecution every day. The guard was annoyed and shouted at me, "Do not come to our jurisdiction district next time. Go somewhere else!" I replied, "It was not I who decided to come. It was you who arrested me and brought me here!"

On the fifteenth day the police had no intention of releasing me and told me it was not the right date yet. I said, "You have never been right in anything. Can it be right to suppress 'Truthfulness, Compassion, Tolerance?'" They finally released me two days later, which was August 6th, 2003.

The Fourth Incarceration

I was arrested for the fourth time when someone reported me to the police for handing out flyers on a bus. I was sentenced to two years of forced labour. I did not acknowledge the sentence and filed an appeal. Guards at the detention centre confiscated my clothes. I asked all the inmates to be my witnesses by signing their names on a document I prepared about the confiscation of my clothes. I told the detention centre head that my clothes should be returned to me, because these were the only clothes I could wear when I went home. However, the authorities ordered several strong men to push me into a police van and drove me to a forced labour camp. Three drug addict inmates served as my personal cangues. I staged a hunger strike. The guards and the inmates threatened me, "If you refuse to be 'reformed¹,' you will be sent to 'reformation' class. If you refuse again, you will be sent back to the forced labour camp." The guards also assigned a very vicious criminal inmate to be my personal cangues. I told the guard, "If a person does not fear death at all, what else could she be afraid of? I am precisely this kind of person." The guard had to say, "You are right."

Th guards also ordered collaborators² to "educate and reform" me. I kept telling them my cultivation experiences to correct their misunderstandings until they had nothing to say.

Seven days before my expected release date, which was May 15th, 2006, the labour camp staff gave me three copies of an "education and reformation" agreement, one for the neighbourhood community administration, one for my family, and one for my place of work. I immediately tore it into pieces. They could not do anything about it and had to give up.

When I was released, I took with me the 300 pictures I drew in the labour camp and the camp uniform. They are material evidence of the human rights abuses I have suffered.

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. "Collaborators": Former practitioners who have turned against Falun Gong under brainwashing and torture. They are then made to assist in brainwashing and torturing practitioners.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2007/9/30/163616.html