Associate Professor from National Prosecutors College Abused in Beijing Women's Prison

Name: Li Li
Gender: Female
Age: Unknown
Address: Unknown
Occupation: Associate Professor from National Prosecutors College
Date of Most Recent Arrest: November 2002
Most Recent Place of Detention: Beijing Women's Prison
City: Beijing
Persecution Suffered: Sleep deprivation, forced labour, brainwashing, imprisonment, solitary confinement, fired from workplace, detention, denial of toilet use

Ms. Li Li is an associate professor in the Philosophy Department at the National Prosecutors College. In 2000, she had to leave her home to avoid the persecution. In November 2002, she was arrested and sentenced to nine years in prison. She has been held in Beijing Women's Prison ever since. She was once deprived of sleep for more than three weeks.

Ms. Li started practising Falun Gong in 1992. After the start of the persecution of Falun Gong on July 20th, 1999, the National Prosecutors College administrators and its parent organization, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, tried to force Ms. Li to give up her belief. Ms. Li said firmly that cultivation was not a crime. Later, she was fired from her job, and her apartment was taken away. She was kept under surveillance by the Bajiao Police Station in the Shijingshan District.

The police identified Ms. Li as their main target to watch, monitoring her around the clock. In 2000, Bajiao Police Station officers tried to take her to a brainwashing programme, so she was forced to leave home. In November 2002, she was arrested in Shenzhen for distributing DVDs about Falun Gong. She was held in the Nanshan Detention Centre in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, and later brought back to Beijing. During her detention in the Fengtai District Detention Centre in Beijing in 2003, she was taken to the brainwashing program at the Beijing Legal Education Centre. Ms. Li did not give in even after one month of non stop brainwashing, so she was taken back to the detention centre.

In 2004, Ms. Li was given a nine-year sentence, and has been held at the Beijing Women's Prison since then. She was held in the No.10 prison ward for several years. In July 2004, all the practitioners in the No.10 ward were examined for their beliefs. Ms. Li expressed her firm belief in Falun Gong. The guards took her to the library to try to “transform” [forcibly renounce Falun Gong] her. After more than a month, Zheng Yumei, head of the prison ward, changed tactics. She ordered Ms. Li to work in the factory during the day, copy the prison rules in the hall during the noon hour and evening break, and didn't allow her to go back to her room until 10:00 p.m. Zheng Yumei also ordered Ms. Li to stand for a long time. She criticized Ms. Li for not standing properly and kicked her in the back.

In November 2004, the prison officials received the order from the Prison Management Bureau to brainwash practitioners with coercive measures. The guards took Ms. Li to an empty prison ward where she was abused physically and mentally. The guards and inmates monitored Ms. Li in three shifts. They deprived her of sleep and forced her to stand for long periods of time. They wrote words on the floor slandering Falun Gong, then made her step on them. Ms. Li walked with a limp when she was taken back to her room. She was followed and monitored in the following years.

The No.10 ward was closed in 2009, and Ms. Li was transferred to the No. 4 ward. Liu Yingchun, head of the No. 4 ward, abused Ms. Li physically and mentally using all kinds of methods. Ms. Li was closely monitored and guards swore at her all day long. She was deprived of sleep for more than 12 days. She was forced to sit on a small plastic stool for long periods of time. She was not allowed to use the toilet, brush her teeth, or even wash her face. The guards later forced her to copy a book about some other religion that was put together by personnel from the No. 4 ward. They forced her to copy it in dim light and didn't let her go to bed until late at night. They forced her to take up that religion. They forced her to watch videos and read books that slandered Falun Gong. Ms. Li wrote letters of appeal describing the torture she suffered but the letters were detained by the monitoring personnel. She wanted to appeal to the prison authorities, but they didn't let her.

Ms. Li hasn't been feeling well recently. She is expected to be released this October.

Beijing Women's Prison (originally called Tiantanghe Prison) is a dreadful place where Falun Gong practitioners are viciously persecuted. They deceive local and international media by claiming "humane and civilized prison management," while, in fact, they carry out the task of "transforming" practitioners by torturing them both physically and mentally. They also brainwash practitioners with carefully crafted lies, utilizing deceptive brainwashing and inhuman physical punishment. Since 2000, the torture of practitioners in the prison resulted in several practitioners' deaths and disabilities.

Earlier report:

http://www.clearwisdom.net/html/articles/2010/11/4/121244.html

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2011/7/14/243868.html