Mr. Yu Xuelun, a Teacher from Macheng City, Remains in Custody after Years of Persecution

Name: Yu Xuelun
Gender: Male
Age: 40
Address: Unknown
Occupation: Teacher

Date of Most Recent Arrest: August 2007
Most Recent Place of Detention: Fanjiatai Prison in Shayang County, Hubei Province

City: Macheng
Province: Hubei
Persecution Suffered: Brainwashing, beatings, imprisonment, extortion, home ransacked, detention

Mr. Yu Xuelun was a highly regarded teacher at Nanhu Middle School in Macheng, Hubei Province. In August 2007, he was arrested and taken to Fanjiatai Prison in the Shayang area. His three-year prison term ended on August 1st, 2010. However, under the direction of the Hubei Province 610 Office (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong), officials from Fanjiatai Prison, the Macheng 610 Office, the Education Department, and the Nanhu Neighbourhood Administration Office coerced leaders of Nanhu Middle School to pay for the extra expenses and escort Mr. Yu to the Hubei Province Brainwashing Centre for 50 days.

I. A Widely Recognised Kind Hearted Man

Mr. Yu Xuelun, 40, was a mathematics teacher at Nanhu Middle School in Macheng, with an undergraduate degree. He was in search of the meaning of life and practised traditional Chinese qigong. In 1994, he started practising Falun Gong, attended the lectures given by Falun Gong's founder, Li Hongzhi, and became the volunteer assistant of the Macheng Falun Gong practice site. He adhered strictly to the principles of Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance at work and in his life. He was widely recognised as a kind hearted man among his colleagues and parents of students. Besides teaching junior mathematics, he was responsible for managing and maintaining the school's water and electric system. He was patient, diligent, amiable, and loved by students.

Mr. Yu benefited from practising Falun Gong. The magnificence of Falun Gong manifested in him numerous times. On one occasion, he was helping his colleague cook and got burned by steam while opening the lid of a high-pressure pot. Half of his face and the area around one of his eyes swelled and turned red. He did not use any medicine, and within one week it was all healed. There was no trace of injury left on his face.

On another occasion, his father-in-law was under pressure from the police, who yelled at him and flipped their table over. Mr. Yu's finger was smashed and fractured in the process. Zhang Jieping, principal of Nanhu Middle School, said, "I will believe in Falun Gong if your finger recovers without you going to the hospital!" Mr. Yu did not see a doctor and his finger soon healed. Unfortunately, once the nationwide persecution started, Zhang began to target practitioners for persecution.

II. Working Odd Jobs after Being Forced to Leave Town

In 1999, Mr. Yu was taken to both the Nanhu Neighbourhood Administration Office and the Nanhu Police Station for meetings, where he was publicly denounced and criticised. Between 2000 and 2004, he was twice held at the No. 1 Detention Centre and once at the No. 2 Detention Centre. On one of these occasions, he was detained for over six months, suffering from beatings and verbal abuse. He was placed under surveillance at his home for an extended period of time. During summer vacation of 2001, he went to the Erqiao area one night. Zhang Jieping, the school principal, spotted him and brought false charges against him to the Nanhu Police Station. He was called into the police station, where the police interrogated him for several hours, and he was released for lack of evidence.

In 2004, members of the Macheng 610 Office and domestic security officers arrested him at Nanhu Middle School. The police tried to take him to the Hubei Province Brainwashing Centre, but Mr. Yu managed to escape. The police then surrounded his home. He had to jump from the second floor of his building to escape, and was forced to stay away from his home to avoid persecution. He ended up having to work odd jobs out of town.

On the evening of June 24th, 2007, half a dozen police officers from the Qiaokou District Police Department forced their way into the office of a recycling company near Fuhao Garden. Mr. Yu's wife worked there as a cook. The officers demanded she tell them the whereabouts of her husband. When she repeatedly told the officers that she had not seen her husband for a couple of days, they forcibly took her to a remote hotel. They prohibited her from sitting down while interrogating her for over two hours. At midnight the previous evening, a group of police officers climbed over the fence to enter the recycling company's warehouse in Wuhan City, Hubei Province. Mr. Yu's son and nephew slept in the warehouse. The officers grabbed the boys, punched them and slapped them in the face in order to locate Mr. Yu. When they failed to get the information, they threatened the two boys not to leave Wuhan so that the police could look for them for more information later. The two boys were so frightened that they were not able to eat or sleep for days.

III. Arrest and Unjust Prison Term

In August 2007, officers from the Xinghuacen District Police Department in Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province arrested Mr. Yu. He was held at the Taiyuan Detention Centre, the Hubei Province Brainwashing Centre, and the Macheng No. 1 Detention Centre. Without a trial, he was sentenced to three years in prison and taken to Fanjiatai Prison in the Shayang area. His younger sister Yu Hua, her non-practitioner husband, and two practitioners Zhu Bidong and Fu Lisheng from Macheng were also implicated.

Mr. Yu lived with his wife's family after getting married to take care of his father-in-law and mother-in-law. He had to support his own parents and his son, as well. Years of persecution, including home ransacking and police extortion, made it hard for his parents and in-laws to make a living. Members of the 610 Office, the police, domestic security officers, officials of the neighbourhood administration office and middle school kept harassing his family. After he was taken to prison, not only did the family lose a major source of income, they also had to send living expenses to the prison, where daily necessities were sold at unreasonably marked up prices in the prison store. As a result of all the stress and anxiety, his father-in-law and his mother passed away. His bedridden father, in his seventies, is anxiously waiting for his return.

Mr. Yu has been held for over 20 days beyond the end of the prison term. His wife has to shoulder the responsibility of supporting both families. She is often in tears.

IV. Facing a New Round of Brainwashing

By May 2010, 167 practitioners were confirmed to have died in Hubei Province from persecution. The Shayang Forced Labour Camp System is one of the most vicious and terrifying facilities across China. Over a dozen labour camps and prisons are located in the area. Ranking military officers of the Nationalist Party (which retreated from the Mainland before 1949) and senior Chinese Communist Party officials who lost power during the Cultural Revolution were held in these facilities. Student activists of the 1989 student democracy movement, which ended in a massacre when the government rolled out tanks on June 4th, 1989, were also held here. Today, Falun Gong practitioners from Hubei Province are being held at Fanjiatai Prison and the notorious Shayang Forced Labour Camp. Practitioners from Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province, are being held at the Hewan Forced Labour Camp.

Mr. Yu's family has been denied any visitation. It is not clear what abuse Mr. Yu has received while being held at Fanjiatai Prison.

The leaders of Nanhu Middle School recently received a notice from the Macheng 610 Office, the Education Department, and the Nanhu Neighbourhood Administration Office that they need to send someone to Fanjiatai Prison to take Mr. Yu to the Hubei Province Brainwashing Centre and pay for his brainwashing there. This brainwashing facility is currently located in the Banqiao area. The Clearwisdom website has exposed crimes that took place there, including torture, deprivation of sleep for extended periods of time, and injection of drugs that damage one's nervous system.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2010/8/27/228878.html