Ms. Shi Jinhua Sentenced to Prison on False Evidence

Ms. Shi Jinhua, 72, was arrested in Shanghai on June 4th, 2010. On October 25th, 2010, she was sentenced to four years in prison for mailing letters that explain the facts about Falun Gong. In prison, to force her into renouncing Falun Gong, the guards tied Ms. Shi's hands behind her back and force-fed her unknown drugs.

Ms. Shi was in poor health after working hard to bring up her three sons. After she began practising Falun Gong in 1998, she regained her health and became full of energy. However, over the past 11 years, Ms. Shi has been arrested and detained 14 times. During detention, she has suffered brutal torture and beatings. Her home has been ransacked many times, and many of her personal belongings have been confiscated. Money has been extorted from her several times.

During Ms. Shin's detention in Nanhui Prison from August 24th to September 10th, 2011, because she refused to cooperate with guards, they often hit her. She was forced to stand up straight for more than two hours on multiple occasions. Six inmates were assigned to monitor and torture her. On January 31st, 2012, she was tied to a death bed and force-fed drugs for two days and nights. When her sons saw her later on, she had only three teeth left since many had been knocked out during torture.

Appeal Letter from Ms. Shi Jinhua's Three Sons

We are Shi Jinhua's sons. We would like to tell you about our mother's suffering and mistreatment over the past 11 years.

We truly hope that those who have, without mercy or conscience while pursuing money and career advancement, participated in our mother's persecution regain their human nature and bravely claim responsibility for their crimes.

In our memories, our mother is a warm, kind, diligent, and traditional woman. She exhibits filial piety and is responsible. She worked very hard to bring us up, but her health had deteriorated along the way. Therefore, she developed many illnesses.

By the end of 1998, many people around the country had taken up practising Falun Gong, and the media focused many reports on those people. When our mother began practising Falun Gong, she regained her health. She became energetic and voluntarily organised a Falun Gong practice site. Many acquaintances of hers acknowledged her miraculous changes. She was both happier and grateful for her wellness.

However, things changed dramatically beyond our imagination.

In July of 1999, the state-run media changed their tone about Falun Gong and declared it illegal; people were not allowed to practise it. Ransacking of practitioners' homes as well as arrests and the detention of practitioners regularly took place. My mother could not understand why such a great practice was suddenly banned. We were also puzzled because our mother had come to know the goodness of Falun Gong through the media. Why was Falun Gong being suppressed?

My mother had difficulty understanding the reason for the suppression, but she did not give in to the persecution. She approached government officials and told them that Falun Gong brings no harm. She thought that the government must have simply misunderstood Falun Gong, and thus made the wrong decision. She thought that if the government understood the goodness of Falun Gong through practitioners' sincere hearts, then the misunderstanding would disappear and the persecution would end. However, she was instead persecuted constantly for her appeal.

From mid August of 1999 to July of 2000, our mother was arrested five times. On each instance, she was subjected to a physically brutal search, home ransacking, extortion, beatings, forced kneeling, or public humiliation on the street. Once, when she was forced to kneel down, a policeman stomped on her calves. Another time, her hand was broken. Her body was covered in bruises each time. She even passed out once during the torture. All of this took place during the process of “transformation” [forcibly renounce Falun Gong].

As her sons, we cannot bear to see her suffering. We have had to beg officials and pay extortion to get her released. We are physically and mentally tired. To prevent her from being arrested, we brought her to live with us. Wherever she went to explain the facts about Falun Gong to people, however, the persecution followed her. Her latest arrest was due to her writing letters that clarify the truth to people. The Shanghai Minxang District Court sentenced her to four years in prison. The court did not notify us about the hearing. After we learned of her sentencing, we hired lawyers to appeal, but all of them failed. The Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate Court upheld the first court's decision without opening a court session.

Why were the judges afraid of holding the hearing publicly? Are they afraid that our family would hire defence lawyers? The judges have actually participated the persecution. That is why they feel guilty and do not dare to open up such cases to family members.

Our mother has suffered in prison for two years. In China, many mothers like ours are suffering similar persecution. Thus, we cannot help but cry out loudly to the law officials that have participated the persecution:

Please give us back our mother!

Please give us back our thousands of mothers!

Please give us back our families!