(Minghui.org) A Harbin City, Heilongjiang Province resident has been subjected to intensified persecution while serving 14 years for her faith in Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been targeted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.
Ms. Tian Xiaoping was arrested on November 13, 2011 and sentenced to 14 years in prison around May 2012. Not long after she was admitted to the Heilongjiang Province Women’s Prison, a guard called her family to say that she exhibited severe heart disease symptoms, and had seizures. The guard asked her loved ones to bring in her medication. When her family visited her on March 14, 2013, they noted that she was unable to walk by herself or talk for more than a few minutes. Her body was also shaking uncontrollably.
It is unclear whether the prison rendered any medical attention to Ms. Tian.
In order to force more Falun Gong practitioners to renounce their faith, the prison hand-selected cruel criminals to “work” on the practitioners. These inmates were given free rein to torture the practitioners without facing any consequences. Shi Genghui, deputy prison warden, was in charge of persecuting Falun Gong practitioners. She once personally “worked” on some practitioners.
The guards also instigated other inmates’ hatred towards Falun Gong practitioners. For instance, the guards would suddenly stop everyone in a cell from brushing their teeth because the practitioner in that cell had not renounced Falun Gong.
Despite the persecution, Ms. Tian held firm to her faith and the guards escalated the persecution of her in recent years. They reduced her monthly in-person family visits to quarterly visits. In between in-person visits, she was allowed only one virtual visit with her family each month. Starting in 2022, she was allowed to spend only 100 yuan on daily necessities per month. As everything is much more expensive in prison, very little could be purchased with 100 yuan.
Group Arrest
Ms. Tian was one of the more than 50 local Falun Gong practitioners arrested on November 13, 2011. Forty-six of them were given forced labor and six were sentenced to prison, with Ms. Tian given the heaviest term of 14 years.
Most of the practitioners were arrested after attending an experience sharing conference at a private home that day. According to an eyewitness, a group of five practitioners was the first to leave the home at around 11:00 p.m. on November 13, 2011. Three of them headed north and soon found that the intersection was blocked by police cars, and that they had been followed. They tried to walk quickly to lose the people following them. An officer shouted through a loudspeakers on the police car, “Arrest them first. The others won’t open the door if we go there right now. Wait until 12:00 a.m. They will open the door after sending righteous thoughts. We will take action then.”
The officers then converged on the three practitioners and arrested them.
The rest of the practitioners finished sharing their experiences at 12:10 a.m. As soon as one of them opened the door, the police broke in and sprayed teargas on the practitioners, who were instantly blinded. Some of them still had red and swollen eyes ten days later. All of the officers had electric batons in their hands. Whoever moved at all was shocked with the batons.
The night turned into chaos. The officers began dragging the practitioners outside one by one, with each practitioner being held by two officers. Most practitioners did not have their shoes on and were forcibly put into the police cars.
Ms. Tian was beaten, her head was bleeding, and her clothes were torn into pieces.
The practitioners were taken to the Shuangcheng District Patrol Office Division and interrogated separately. They were then moved to different facilities, including the Harbin City No. 2 Detention Center, the Shuangcheng District Detention Center, and the Shuangcheng District Lockup.
Ms. Tian was interrogated with torture at the Harbin City No. 2 Detention Center. Three officers from the Harbin City Police Department, including Yao Shoujun and Lu Jun, tied her up in a chair with her hands twisted behind her back and fastened to the back of the chair. They then hung her up by the ropes around her wrists. They also shone a bright light right right into her face. Lu kicked her on the knees and ordered her to say things that would incriminate her. The light was so strong that her lips chapped. Her arms turned black and didn’t return to their normal color until many days later.
Related Reports:
Fifty-Six Practitioners Arrested in Heilongjiang Province
How Guards in Heilongjiang Province Women’s Prison Torture Practitioners of Falun Dafa
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