68-Year-Old Ms. Shi Jinhua from Qidong County, Hunan Province Arrested 13 Times

Name: Shi Jinhua
Gender: Female
Age: 68
Address: Hunan Province Qidong County Baidi City Steel Factory
Occupation: Retired worker from the steel factory
Date of Most Recent Arrest: March 2009
Most recent place of detention: Qidong County Detention Centre
City: Qidong County
Province: Hunan
Persecution Suffered: Electric Shock, Forced Labour, Beatings, Hung Up, Torture, Extortion, Home Ransacked, Interrogation, Detention

Key Persecutors: He Zhengrong, Wang Ximin, Li Wei, and instructor Li Guoping from Qidong County Public Security Bureau, Detention Centre Director Liu Jintian, Zhou Yuzong, Zhou Daosheng, among others.

Sixty-eight-year-old Falun Gong practitioner Shi Jinhua from Qidong County, Hengyang City, Hunan Province has been arrested by the police 13 times. The police have extorted over 10,000 yuan from her family and took over 5,000 yuan worth of property from her home.

Ms. Shi began practising Falun Gong in 1998. Before then, she had many diseases. After she began practising, she realised that this was what she had always looked for. She studied the Falun Dafa books and did the exercises everyday. Gradually, she became healthy. All of her diseases were gone. She told everyone she met how great Falun Gong was.

On August 15th, 1999, the Qidong County Public Safety Bureau and police station began harassing the co-ordinators and assistants at the Falun Gong group practice sites. He Zhengrong, Wang Ximin, Li Wei and instructor Li Guoping from the County Public Safety Bureau, Guan Zhilong from the security division of Ms. Shi's workplace, and several other policemen went to her workplace and forced the workplace to pay them several thousand yuan of Ms. Shi's money under the pretence that they were going to Shenzhen, where her son lived, to arrest her. Ms. Shi heard the news and came back. However, the police still spent her money and went to Shenzhen for a few days of sight-seeing. After they returned, they broke into her house and handcuffed her. She was taken to the detention centre. Her three sons heard the news and came back from out of town. They used their relationships and had to give bribes. After ten days of detention and a 3,000-yuan payment to the police, Ms. Shi was released.

On September 10th, She was taken away again and detained for two weeks. The police only released her after her family paid another 3,000 yuan.

On September 28th, Ms. Shi and a few other practitioners went to Beijing to appeal the persecution of Falun Gong. They were searched and arrested at the Beijing train station. They were kept in an alley near the train station overnight. The next day, they were taken to the Hunan Provincial Affairs Office in Beijing. The police at the office took the money they carried and transported them to the Public Security Bureau in their home county. At the Public Security Bureau, He Zhengrong handcuffed them all. They were taken to the County Detention Centre. On the morning of October 4th, the county government held a public meeting. The practitioners were tied with a rope and put on stage. Ms. Shi shouted, "We are not bad people. Falun Gong practitioners are good people. Falun Gong is great." Just when she finished, a policeman hit the corner of her eye with his fist. She almost fell down. After the meeting, the practitioners were paraded in the streets with convicted criminals. At the detention centre, Ms. Shi refused to give up her faith and was beaten every day. She was detained for two months.

On January 9th, 2000, Ms. Shi and other practitioners left for Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong again. They were stopped by the police on the way and sent to the county detention centre. After lunch on January 11th, He Zhengrong, Li Wei and Wang Ximin from the Public Security Bureau and Director Liu Jintian, Zhou Yuzong, and Zhou Daosheng from the detention centre forced Ms. Shi and other practitioners to kneel on ground paved with pebbles. About ten policemen with hard-sole leather shoes kicked and beat them brutally. Ms. Shi was beaten so hard that she passed out on the ground for at least ten minutes. The police were afraid that the inmates would see the beating, so they moved the practitioners to a remote location. The police forced the practitioners to raise their hands, and beat their faces, bodies, feet, and back of their hands with wooden sticks, bamboo poles, and bamboo slabs. The practitioners' faces, ankles and hands were beaten until they were swollen, their bodies were full of bruises. The police also jumped on their calves until their bones were making cracking sounds. The police tortured them until 5:30 p.m. Ms. Shi's son again had to pay 1,500 yuan in bribes and other gifts to gain her release. Ms. Shi was released after four months of torture.

In June 2000, Ms. Shi again went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. This time, she ran into Falun Gong practitioners in Beijing and stayed with them, where she helped out with some projects. After she returned home, at about 7 p.m. On July 4th, Wang Ximin from the Public Security Bureau and Li Guoping from the police station, as well as a dozen policemen, broke into Ms. Shi's house. Li grabbed her hand and broke the bones in it. Another two policemen pushed her to the ground, while the other policeman raided her home and took away Falun Gong books, videos, as well as money and electronics. She was taken to the detention centre, and was tortured for four months. Her family again had to pay 1,000 yuan to gain her release.

Ms. Shi's repeated detention worried her sons. On November 10th, her son made her move in with him in Shenzhen to protect her. However, she remembered that she was a Falun Gong practitioner and could not seek comfort without publicising the facts about the persecution. She used 200 yuan her son gave her to print 200 handouts, and distributed them in the Shenzhen Science and Technology District. Unfortunately, she ran into a plainclothes policeman. Director Bo and a man surnamed He of the Nanshan District Public Security Bureau in Shenzhen sent her to the Sanshui Women's Re-education Centre, where she was tortured.

Soon after her release, she was detained again when she was distributing Falun Gong publications, and was again sent to the Sanshui Women's Re-education Centre. She was not released until October 2003.

After Ms. Shi returned home, she reconnected with other practitioners. On November 5th, 2003, she received from a fellow practitioner two DVDs that explained the persecution of Falun Gong. He Zhengrong from the Public Security Bureau and a dozen police broken into her home again. They found the discs and accused her of trying to intercept TV signals to air Falun Gong programmes. They confiscated her TV, DVD player, recorder and Falun Gong books. She was taken to the county detention centre and was tortured there. On February 2nd, 2004, she escaped from the detention centre.

On July 7th, 2004, Ms. Shi was reported when distributing materials about the persecution, and was taken away by police. At the county's state security team, policeman Wang Xiaobing asked for her name and address, and she did not answer. She only tried to explain to him the facts of the persecution. The police didn't listen and beat her instead. In particular, policeman Zou Aiming and a policeman surnamed Zhou hung her up by the wrist and only allowed her toes to touch the ground. She was hung like that for three hours. Zhou also broke into her home through climbing into her second-story balcony. Her Falun Gong books, money, and some electronics were taken away. Ms. Shi was sent to the detention centre and escaped after 15 days.

On December 29th, 2005, Ms. Shi was distributing DVDs about quitting the Chinese Communist Party when she was apprehended by police. A group of police ransacked her home and took away many valuables. Policemen Zou and Zhou again hung her up and beat her. She was released after a few days.

In the summer of 2008, before the Beijing Olympic Games, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) harassed and detained practitioners with the excuse of keeping order during the Olympics. On August 4th, about ten policemen broke into Ms. Shi's home and ransacked it. She tried to explain to them the situation but they did not listen. Instead, they beat her brutally. She was detained for two weeks.

In March 2009, Ms. Shi went from her son's home to her hometown to visit her 97-year-old mother. While she was waiting for a bus, she handed out materials about the persecution and quitting the CCP. A tricycle driver reported her and took her to the police station. He also said that he often saw her handing out Falun Gong materials at the public market. Policemen Wang Xiaobing, Liu, Zou Aimin, and Peng Jian kept her at the county detention centre. She was again detained for 15 days.

Note

1. "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/2009/10/4/209616.html