A Personal Account of the Persecution of Ms. Deng Lijuan

My husband Mr. Zheng Fuxiang and I started practising Falun Gong due to poor health. We benefited tremendously from Falun Gong. All of our diseases disappeared in a short 20 days and we lived happily from the moment that we first started practising.

On July 20th, 1999, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) started persecuting Falun Gong. My husband and I went to Beijing to appeal for justice but were arrested and sent back to Yushu City. We were held in the detention centre and tortured for two months before being released. At that time, my six-year-old son was at home alone, without with no one to cook for him or take care of him.

In 2000, my husband went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong again. He just made it to Changchun City before he was arrested and sent back to the Yushu Police Department. He was taken to Fenjin Detention Centre in Changchun City to be tortured and then was transferred to Weizigou Detention Centre and then Chaoyanggou Detention Centre for further abuse. He was brutally tortured in the detention centres before finally returning home after one and a half years. Scabies covered his body and he was too weak to feed or care for himself. My husband gradually recovered, however, through practising Falun Gong.

Around 11 p.m. on March 11th, 2002, we were awakened by a loud noise from outside. Suddenly my door flung open. The former director of Qingshan Village Police Station, Zhang Dezhi, led his staff members Ma Kai, Li Zhanmin, Zhang Wenge and a driver, Bian Erhua, to break into my home. Without showing any ID or official documents, they pulled me and my husband out of bed and started beating us. My son was terrified and started crying. They kicked my husband's genitals and shouted some bad words. They took off their belts and whipped my husband for over 20 minutes. I tried to stop them but they would not listen and instead started to beat me. They searched all over the house and then took me and my husband into the police car. We were held in the Yushu Detention Centre for half a month and then transferred to a forced labour camp for ten days. I was tortured in the Heizuizi Forced Labour Camp in Changchun City for one year and my husband was tortured for three years.

After I completed the prison sentence and returned home, the police continued to harass me. I was forced to leave home and become homeless. My husband almost died from the torture he suffered at Chaoyanggou Forced Labour Camp because he refused to give up practising Falun Gong. The camp was afraid of taking responsibility so they required that a family member come to pick him up. At that time, he couldn't walk and scabies covered his body. The camp even threatened him and told him not to tell people that he was tortured by electric shock. He was afraid of telling us anything even when we asked. He died on April 7th, 2004, three days after he returned home.

When I heard that he was home and in poor condition, I hurried home but didn't make it in time to say my last words to him. His eyes were still open when he died. He was only 35 years old. A healthy man was thus tortured to death just because he wanted to be a better person.

The police station heard that I came home to attend my husband's funeral, and so the director, Zhang Dezhi, led his staff member Ma Kai and others to the graveyard to arrest me. I had to become homeless again in order not to be persecuted.

My son didn't have money to go to school nor did he have money for food. He had to get a job doing manual labour job at the age of 13 years old. My child suffered depression due to the hardships in his life.

On June 21st, 2010, my son died in a car accident. My family of three lived a happy life but now I am the only one left. My family was torn apart by the persecution just because we practise Falun Gong and follow the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2011/7/7/243528.html