Eleven Practitioners Sentenced to Prison in Sichuan Province

On October 10th, 2008, the Wuhou District Court in Chengdu City, Sichuan Province held the second part of an open trial to sentence eleven Falun Gong practitioners, including Ms. Zhong Fangqiong. The families of the practitioners were blocked from entering the courtroom. Ms. Zhong was sentenced to seven years in prison, Mr. Liu Jia and Ms. Mao Kun each to five and a half years, Mr. Jiang Zonglin and Mr. Liu Bangcheng (72 years old) each to five years, Mr. Zhu Renbin, Mr. Ding Zeyang (retired professor from Sichuan University), and Ms. Jiang Hongyuan each to four years, Ms. Mao Qi, Ms. Qin Min and Ms. Che Shikun each to three years.

The trial was scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m., but the court started earlier, allowing only a chosen "audience" to be seated at 9:00 a.m. The lawyers were scanned by a machine upon entering the court, but the fake audience was not. The trial lasted until 3:00 p.m. People saw that Mr. Zhu Renbin was holding his stomach, his face was very pale, and his body was bent over, and he could not talk. He looked like he was in a lot of pain.

Practitioners shouted "Falun Gong is good" when they exited the court. The guards beat them after dragging them out to avoid being video recorded by cameras. Many people passing by asked what was going on after witnessing such brutality.

There were police vehicles surrounding the courthouse, and many police and some plain-clothes police filled the whole block. Some officers who were holding cameras took photos of people passing by and practitioners' families. The people passing by were requested to sign their names on a sheet, otherwise they would have to leave quickly. Several journalists were interviewing people.

These eleven practitioners were among the thirty some practitioners arrested from August to September. They all endured torture in the Chengdu City Detention Centre.

Related report: http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2008/10/6/101242.html

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2008/10/12/187564.html