Mr. Ma Yingxuan, Almost 70, Spends Three Years in Jail in Jiangsu Province

Mr. Ma Yingxuan is nearly 70 years old and comes from in Xinan Town, Xinyi City, Jiangsu Province. He started practising Falun Gong in the spring of 1996. In January 2002, Mr. Ma's nephew rented a room in a building at the Xinan Town intersection and used it as a barbershop. He played Falun Gong music in his shop and this was reported to the township's local police station by Public Security officer Qiao Sundaier. Mr. Ma's nephew was then arrested by a local police officer surnamed Geng, who brutally tortured Mr. Ma's nephew in order to extort evidence from him. When Ma's nephew finally couldn't bear the torture any longer, he told the police about Mr. Ma Yingxuan. Mr. Ma was arrested on the evening of January 27th. The police let him suffer in a cold cell overnight. At eight o'clock the second day, Mr. Ma was handcuffed to an Iron Chair¹. The police took turns trampling on Mr. Ma and accused him of hanging a Falun Gong banner in the barbershop. In the afternoon, the police hung Mr. Ma up by his handcuffs. The pain was so severe that he had to bite hard to stop his teeth from chattering. Still, he refused to give the police the names of other practitioners. After his body no longer moved, an instructor named Feng told the other police officers to let him down and untie him. On February 14th, 2002, he was finally free to go home. Mr. Ma had been detained for half a month in a detention centre.

On February 28th, 2002, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) personnel from Xinyi City visited Mr. Ma and tried to force him to write a so called "Guarantee Statement" not to practise Falun Gong. They gave him three days to write the statement, but Mr. Ma refused. As a result he was forced to leave home to avoid further persecution. He became destitute and homeless, wandering around Linyi, Tancheng County, Shandong Province, to keep from being arrested again.

In the morning of March 5th, 2002, Mr. Ma went to Tancheng Town to visit a practitioner, Ms. Yang Meizhong, to get leaflets exposing the persecution of Falun Gong. He was arrested by 610 Office² personnel, Director Liu Yuhong, and Assistant Director Zhuge from Tancheng County. He was imprisoned at the Chengdong local police station. Police officers confiscated 273 yuan³ from Mr. Ma, money which he had earned through his hard labour working in a rice field. Later, Mr. Ma was taken to the Tancheng police station and was interrogated by officers eight times, including officers from Xinan City. The police handcuffed him and covered his head with a black bag each time they brought him in for interrogation. In the police station, Mr. Ma was so badly tortured that there were all kinds of injuries all over him. Even though there was a warning sign in the prison corridor entrance that stated "Striking and torturing prisoners is forbidden," the prison warden and his guards ignored the rule. Improper treatment of Falun Gong practitioners was prevalent throughout this eighteen-cell prison complex.

Later, Mr. Ma was sentenced to a three-and-a-half-year term. Ms. Yang Meizhong was sentenced to eight years and another elderly practitioner, Ms. Ma Guiju, was sentenced to one and a half years of forced labour. On October 10th, 2006, Mr. Ma Yingxuan and five young practitioners were sent to do hard labour working in a coal cellar at the Weishan jail. However, Weishan jail officials didn't want to accept Mr. Ma, so he was taken back to the police station. On October 20th, 2006, Mr. Ma was then taken to the Taian jail and was imprisoned under heavy security, including being watched 24 hours a day by surveillance cameras, guards, and prison inmates who acted as informers. The nearly 70-year-old Mr. Ma finally was released prison and went home in 2008.

Note

1. Iron Chair: The "Iron chair" is made of iron pipes. Victims are restrained on the iron chairs with both arms and legs tied for a long period of time, see illustration at http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2002/1/9/17577.html

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.

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

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2009/2/13/195370.html