Mr. Zhang Xu from Yitong County, Jilin Province, Has Suffered Five Years of Detention and Persecution

Name: Zhang Xu
Gender: Male
Age: Unknown
Address: Hongming Village, Changchun City
Occupation: Unknown

Date of Most Recent Arrest: March 15th, 2002
Most recent place of detention: Jilin City Second Prison
City: Jilin City
Province: Jilin Province
Persecution Suffered: Imprisonment, Home Ransacked, Interrogation, Beatings, Torture, Sleep Deprivation, Forced Labour, Solitary Confinement

Mr. Zhang Xu is a Falun Gong practitioner from Yitong County, Jilin Province. While doing odd jobs in Changchun City in March 2002, he was arrested and tortured. In November 2002 he was sentenced to five years and sent to Jilin City Second Prison. He wasn't released until around New Year's Day 2008.

Police Tortured Mr. Zhang in an Attempt to Extort a Confession from Him

On the morning of March 15th, 2002, Mr. Zhang left his home in Hongming Village in Changchun to deliver newspapers as usual. When he was halfway to his destination, several people suddenly jumped out of a car and intercepted him. They grabbed him and pushed him into the car, where he was shocked to see his wife, who had been seized a short time before. The men took the couple to Kaifa District Police Department in Changchun and then went back to ransack their home. At that time, Mr. Zhang's mother and his four-year-old child were at home. After these men came back to the police department, they interrogated Zhang Xu and his wife separately. Around evening time, they brought in a tiger bench¹. Directed by the police chief, a policeman and 3 or 4 young men in plainclothes tortured Mr. Zhang. They hit him with metal objects, leaving injuries on his wrists, lower back, and ankles. They also stabbed his fingers with needles and covered his head with plastic bags. They didn't give him any water to drink or allow him to sleep. One man put a copy of a Falun Gong book on his chest while another man banged the book with a hammer. They cursed him all the while and said this manner of beating only resulted in internal injuries, leaving nothing visible. After the beatings, they poured cold water on him and stripped him, making him suffer from the freezing cold. It was snowing outside. They kept the window wide open and turned on an electric fan and pointed it towards him.

When the several men became exhausted from torturing Mr. Zhang, they had two people watch him. One of the men held a ruler in his hand. As soon as Mr. Zhang closed his eyes, that man would hit him with the ruler or stab him with a needle. There was another man that recorded the whole process on paper. Such on-and-off torture sessions went on for four days, until the night of March 18, when two men carried Mr. Zhang to Changchun Third Detention Centre. There the guards took note of his injuries and then put him in a cell. By October of that year, Zhang Xu still had not fully recovered from his injuries.

Sentenced to Five Years

Around November 2002, Kaifa District Court sentenced Mr. Zhang to five years on a charge of distributing 700 Falun Gong flyers. The verdict had already been prepared back in August. Mr. Zhang appealed, only to have the initial verdict upheld. He did not have anyone to defend him.

Mr. Zhang was transferred to Jilin City Second Prison around July 2003, where the guards assigned him to Division Nine. Four days into his detention, they began to subject him to intensive reform sessions. Ten days later he was sent to a pencil factory workshop. The guards used criminals to monitor him, making sure he had no contact with other detained practitioners. Around November or December, Mr. Zhang declared that his earlier statements to give up his cultivation practice were nullified. Under the directive of the Division Four head, the guards set up a solitary confinement cell where they tortured him for three days. Afterwards, they transferred him to Division Eight and then to Division Six.

Around October 2007, Mr. Zhang was transferred to Division Ten. Because he refused to give up his practice, he was put in a solitary confinement cell in November. He was released around New Year's Day 2008. The perpetrators included guard Wang Yuanchun and criminal inmates Zhang Chunyu and Meng Xiangfei.

Prior Persecution of Zhang Xu

Mr. Zhang had been persecuted on numerous occasions before his arrest in March 2002. He and his wife went to Changchun in March 2001 to do odd jobs. His wife worked as a newspaper delivery person for Changchun Evening News in the Jingyue Office. One day the Xiwei Police Station chief in Yitong, a local official, and one or two others appeared at the couple's rental place in Changchun and demanded that Mr. Zhang write a guarantee statement promising not to go to Beijing to appeal. When he refused, they took him to Yitong Detention Centre. They gave him a 15-day detention term. However, they kept him until March 22nd, when agents from Yitong County Police Department and Xiwei Town came to take him to a county brainwashing centre. They threatened to send him to a forced labour camp if he refused to give up his practice. Before finally releasing him, the guards extorted 400 yuan² from his family for "meal fees."

Before Mr. Zhang and his wife went to Changchun to do temporary jobs, they had a baby back in 1999. Around October 1999, Mr. Zhang was taking care of his wife, who was recovering from childbirth, when policemen Shi Baojun and Lu Yucheng from Xiwei Police Station drove to their home and told him to write a guarantee statement. After he refused, the police took him to the police station and detained him for seven days on a charge of disturbing social order. It was the Mid-autumn Festival. After his detention term expired, because he again refused to write a guarantee statement to renounce Falun Gong, the police kept him for another 15 days before allowing his family to pick him up. His family had to pay meal fees, and his neighbours had to guarantee that he would not leave the village.

Note

1. "Tiger Bench": Prisoners are forced to sit on a small iron bench that is approximately 20 cm (6 inches) tall with their knees tied together. With their hands tied behind their backs or sometimes placed on their knees, they are forced to sit straight up and look straight ahead without movement for long periods of time.

2. "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://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2009/10/9/209954.html