Ms. Xu Zhen Murdered in Chongqing Women's Forced Labour Camp

Name: Xu Zhen
Gender: Female
Age: 46
Address: 128 Shiji Avenue, Nanjin Street, Hechuan District, Chongqing
Occupation: Employee of Hechuan Power Company
Date of Death: October 19th, 2011
Date of Most Recent Arrest: September 20th, 2011
Most Recent Place of Detention: Chongqing Women's Forced Labour Camp
City: Chongqing
Persecution Suffered: Sleep deprivation, beatings, solitary confinement, torture, sexual assault, physical restraint, home ransacked, detention

Ms. Xu Zhen was arrested in a residential area on September 20th for distributing pamphlets about Falun Gong. She was taken to the Chongqing Women's Forced Labour Camp on September 26th. As Ms. Xu refused to cooperate, the camp guards took her to the fourth floor and instigated a group of inmates to torture her. On October 19th, she was tortured to death.

Ms. Xu was a healthy, middle-aged woman. On September 20th, she was arrested and taken to the Hechuan Detention Centre. The police later ransacked her home and confiscated a brand new laptop computer, an MP3 player, Falun Gong books, and pamphlets.

On September 26th, Ms. Xu was taken to the Chongqing Women's Forced Labour Camp. She refused to cooperate, shouting, “Falun Gong is good!” The guards dragged Ms. Xu to the fourth floor, where a monitoring device was not installed, and beat her severely. Camp authorities then ordered a male guard, Yu Xiaohua, to organise a group of inmates to monitor and torture Ms. Xu up on the fourth floor.
Guard Yu praised the inmates who beat Ms. Xu, telling them that they were accumulating merit by doing so, and that the more severe the torture, the better. He also rewarded them with fruit to eat. After being rewarded, the inmates escalated their persecution of Ms. Xu. They taped her mouth and feet, punched and kicked her, and continued to torture her with various means.

From September 26th to 28th, Ms. Xu lost consciousness during the beatings many times. The inmates poured cold water on her to wake her up before continuing to beat her. Inmates Tang Hongxia and Zhou Yi stuffed cardboard into her private area and forced her to repeatedly get up and squat down. The torture caused Ms. Xu to bleed profusely, and she was in critical condition.

The inmates routinely dragged Ms. Xu up to the fourth floor to continue torturing her during the day, and they locked her in solitary confinement at night. There was nothing in the solitary confinement cell, and Ms. Xu was forced to sleep on the ground. Ms. Xu became very weak and emaciated.

On October 11th and 12th, guard Zhu Yan was on duty. Zhu forced Ms. Xu to report to her and then stated that Ms. Xu's tone of voice was rude. Zhu then ordered the inmates to torture Ms. Xu more brutally. Zhu also commanded the inmates to wake Ms. Xu at 5:00 a.m. and to keep her awake until 1:00 a.m the next morning. Guard Yu even cooked noodles to reward the inmates who participated in these beatings.

Around October 19th, Qin Fang, a drug addicted inmate, suffocated Ms. Xu to death with a blanket. On October 20, in order to conceal the truth of her death, the camp authorities moved Ms. Xu's body to the yard of the Camp Clinic before putting her body into an ambulance and driving it to a hospital. In the meantime, the remaining imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners were called into a room to prevent them from finding out about Ms. Xu's murder. Around 8:00 p.m. that evening, the stretcher that was used to transport Ms. Xu's body was returned. The camp went on high alert, and every guard was called on duty for the whole week. The camp cut off communication with the outside and refused to allow any kind of visitation, claiming that they were remodelling.

During the high alert, Ms. Xu's family came to the camp and requested a visit with her. The camp authorities refused to grant them admission. Meanwhile, they announced to the inmates that Ms. Xu was released on medical parole due to mental problems.

On October 28th, one week after Ms. Xu's death, inmate Zhou Yi said happily, “Guard Yu [Xiaohua] said [the murder] has been smoothed out and I will not be held responsible.” The camp then lowered its alert level.

It was alleged that the Hechuan District 610 Office head (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong), Chen Dexing, and the Police Department deputy director, Lan Qifeng, ordered their personnel to circulate lies to deceive Ms. Xu's family and workplace. They claimed that Ms. Xu died from an illness, and they forced Ms. Xu's brother and son to sign an agreement.

Currently, there are more than 20 practitioners being held at the Chongqing Women's Forced Labour Camp. The criminals who murdered Ms. Xu are still acting outside of the law. We call for help to stop the persecution that is taking place in Chongqing.

Inmates involved in the persecution of Ms. Xu:

Chen Lingmei, Tang Hongxia, Zhou Yi, Qin Fang, Zhang Jun, Zhang Xingli, Deng Xiaomin
Guards involved in the persecution of Ms. Xu:
Yu Xiaohua, Han Lu, Zhu Yan, Tao Xin, Yang Yi, Jian Jie
Lan Qifeng, deputy director of the Hechuan Police Department
Chen Dexing, head of the Hechuan District 610 Office: +86-18623371818 (M)

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2011/11/29/249956.html