How Three Young Women Changed Their Lives

Three young women that had committed crimes for different reasons were sentenced to jail. One had been born into a well-to-do family and had been a marvellous student in school. She got entangled in love affairs and, with her boyfriend, accidentally killed her former boyfriend. She was 18 at the time. Another was jailed because she tried to protect her boyfriend when drugs were found at her residence. The third one sold drugs out of ignorance.

There were many practitioners in this jail who had been imprisoned just because they refused to renounce their beliefs, especially in the female cells, and every cell had practitioners in it. The three girls met several practitioners that told them the facts about the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) persecution of Dafa, that practitioners were brutally tortured by the CCP just because of their beliefs, and that Dafa has been spread around the world. They all saw the truth and knew that Dafa was good. They recognised the evilness of the CCP, and all three quit the CCP and its associated organisations. Living with these practitioners over a period of time, they witnessed the goodness of practitioners and their perseverance when faced with tribulations. They observed their steadfastness in insisting on sticking to the truth regardless of the persecution. The three were deeply moved.

During this time, the practitioners told them how to behave properly and explained the principles of karmic retribution, that is, being held ultimately accountable for one's own actions. They told them about the divine culture of Chinese civilisation and that the atheism that the CCP promoted had caused the moral degeneration of the entire society. Practitioners wrote down Teacher's poems that they had memorised for the girls to read.

Gradually, the three were able to understand more and more. They discovered a completely different path for a person's life, which Dafa had displayed for them. They decided to practise Falun Gong. They quickly learned the five exercises and began to practise every day. Practitioners also told them that, as practitioners, they needed to critically examine themselves and needed to follow the principles of "Truthfulness, Compassion, and Tolerance". Whether in jail or in society in the future, they needed to be good. All three of them acknowledged this, and the paths of their lives changed completely.

Jail life was very hard. Inmates were not allowed to buy extra food or daily necessities on their own. The jail supplied the bare necessities for everyone each month. The quality of the items provided was very poor. The inmates had to sit everyday and, except for a specific exercise time, were not permitted to move around or even to stretch their legs. Under such harsh conditions, the health of many inmates deteriorated very quickly, and they suffered serious malnutrition. If one got sick, the prescribed drugs were of the lowest quality, often for general use. In 2007, someone got sick and died because she was not treated properly. Since practitioners were all very healthy because they cultivated Dafa, many people wanted to learn. When they did, they became healthy also, and they became happier and their facial tone improved.

The police used all kinds of tactics to try to keep the three girls from doing the exercises. They were penalised by being made to do training and writing self-examining papers when they did the exercises when waiting for the shower. The police threatened to cut out the TV time for the whole group in the cell to force the three to write their examination papers. They would broadcast on the public address system to disturb the whole group after they had gone to bed to demand the papers. The three did not comply. Instead, they wrote a letter telling the police the facts about Dafa, which they signed "Dafa practitioners." The policewoman on duty swore at them. The next day, the cell director and another policewoman came and began to verbally abuse the three girls and ordered them to stand as punishment. They refused, and insisted that they had done nothing wrong. The police immediately ordered people to put shackles on them and chained them to a ring in a round pit in the ground. The shackles and the chain forced them into a painful, bent position. The punishment usually lasted for 15 days according to jail rules.

After this incident, everyone in the cell petitioned to have the shackles removed from the girls. The practitioners in the cell kept telling the policewoman the facts and wrote a letter to her, telling her that doing Falun Gong exercises was not wrong. In the meantime, they asked to meet with the warden and the district attorney, and also reported to higher authorities. The warden rejected their request, citing that practitioners had refused to wear handcuffs and to bend their heads under the iron chain as reasons. One of the three girls was released when her jail term ended, but she was shackled the entire time until then. Later, the district attorney rejected the practitioners' request to meet, citing the fact the three girls were not jailed because of Dafa, meaning that they did not follow "Truthfulness, Compassion, and Tolerance" and therefore were not allowed to practice.

The three girls did not violate any regulation. All they did was to do exercises, but they were severely punished. They intend to sue the police for "cruelties to inmates."