Jilin Province Women's Prison Tortures Practitioners with Death Bed

Jilin Province Women's Prison, also known as Heizuizi Women's Prison of Changchun City, is currently detaining over 260 Falun Gong practitioners, most of whom were sentenced by the authorities within Jilin Province. To try to force practitioners to give up their belief in Falun Gong, the guards subject them to brainwashing and force them to stand or sit in the same posture for extended periods of time. When these methods do not produce any results, guards tie practitioners to a death bed¹.

Newly detained practitioners are forced to go through brainwashing sessions. If they refuse to give up their practice of Falun Gong, the authorities tie their limbs to a bed frame. They suspend the victim in the air so that she does not touch the bed. In this position, she has to eat, urinate and defecate on the bed. This inhuman torture method is extremely agonizing. Some practitioners' wrists and ankles are severely bruised and cut deeply by the tight restraints.

Besides the death bed torture, officials use another, more brutal method. They remove the middle slat from the bed and hang the victim by her limbs from the bed frame. The victim's upper back falls on the edge of the upper bed frame and the lower legs fall on the lower edge of the bed frame. In this posture, each minute is very hard to endure. The authorities usually carry out this torture at night to avoid being discovered by more people. Usually, the victim is forced to stay in the same position the whole night. The first half of the night, the victim might still be awake. By the second half, the victim is bound to pass out due to the severe pain.

To make it even more painful, the guards would sometimes remove all the slats from the bed, tie the victim's hands on the bed leaning the whole weight of the body on the thin edge of the bed frame. When the victim is released after a night of this torture, she is not able to move at all and her legs are swollen completely. These torture methods are routinely carried out on steadfast Falun Gong practitioners detained in Heizuizi Women's Prison.

Ms. Yang Xuzi, a practitioner from Liaoyuan City, was detained in the Heizuizi Women's Prison. She was subjected to the death bed torture for several years, which caused numerous scars and serious health problems, including heart disease and rheumatoid arthritis. As a result of the torture, she now has to wear thick winter clothes in the spring and summer. She has to wear special cotton covers on her wrists and ankles. If she feels a little bit of cold, she suffers tremendous pain.

Ms. Wang Xingxiang, a practitioner from Dehui City, was tortured multiple times in prison. In 2006, she was tied to a death bed for several months. Her wrists bear clear scars to this day. She said, "Believing in Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance can never be wrong" during a brainwashing session in 2007. She was dragged by inmates led by Zhao Guifeng to the fifth floor, where she was tied to a death bed for over six months. During the whole time, she was not allowed to use the toilet and had to soil the bed. Her buttocks ulcerated and her whole body was covered in scabies. Her clothes became glued to her skin.

There are still many Falun Gong practitioners detained in Heizuizi Women's Prison, where the same torture is still taking place.

Jilin Province Women's Prison (Heizuizi Women's Prison of Changchun City)

Address: Jilin Women's Prison, Mail Box #1048, Zip code 130000

Area code: 86-431
Prison: 5375089

Prison hospital: 5375084, 5375008
Wu Zeyun, deputy warden: 5375004
Li Jian, deputy head of the prison administration division: 5375007
Xu Guangsheng, warden: 5375001
Gao Mingya, deputy warden: 5375002
Wang Jie, deputy warden: 5375003
Zhao Xijun, CCP committee secretary of the prison: 5375005

Note

1. "Death Bed" torture: A practitioner is tied to a bed with his hands handcuffed above his head to the bed rails, and his legs tied with thin nylon ropes. The rope is then tightly wrapped around the practitioner's body and the bed, from his legs to his chest. The rope is wrapped so tightly that the practitioner has difficulty breathing and eventually loses consciousness.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2010/7/3/226373.html