Ma Qingping, a Teacher from Puyang City, Henan Province, Persecuted by Local Law Enforcement

Ma Qingping, a fine arts teacher in Puyang City, was sentenced to four years in prison for making New Years greeting cards which displayed the words, "Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance." The principal of the school in which he was teaching reported him to the police.

Mr. Ma Qingping, who was 30 years old at that time, is a Falun Gong practitioner from Liyuan Township, Puyang County. He was arrested on March 24th, 2009 by four separate entities, the 610 Office (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong) in Puyang County, the Domestic Security Division in Puyang County, the 610 Office in Puyang City and the Domestic Security Division under the Puyang City Public Security Bureau. Mr. Ma's personal belongings were confiscated, including a laptop computer and Falun Gong materials, and he was detained at the detention centre in Puyang County. He was officially arrested on April 23rd. The Puyang County Procuratorate sued him on July 21st. Wang Xiaoqing was the procurator. On September 22nd, the Puyang County People's Court sentenced him to four years in prison. The presiding judge was Wang Yingchun. Hou Lizhen and Han Xiaoyan were also judges. Lu Yuping was the court clerk.

Before the Winter school holiday last year, Mr. Ma Qingping bought the materials for 200 greeting cards with his own money and made cards on which he painted seven fairies, and the words, "Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance." On the morning of March 20th, the principal of his school, Hao, heard about it and asked one of the students to show him the greeting card. That evening Hao had a two-hour talk with Mr. Ma. He put huge pressure on Mr. Ma, then he reported him to the Public Security Bureau. He helped police to pressure the 170 students to hand in the greeting cards. They got 117 cards. The remaining cards were kept by students who refused to hand them in. Those students wanted to show the police and the principal that their teacher was not committing any crimes. Hao demanded that several students be witnesses in an effort to frame their teacher.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2009/12/31/215397.html