(Minghui.org)
Name: Wang LigongChinese Name: 王立功Gender: MaleAge: 76City: ChangchunProvince: JilinOccupation: ResearcherDate of Death: Around November 2024Date of Most Recent Arrest: August 26, 2023Most Recent Place of Detention: Gongzhuling Prison
A 76-year-old man in Changchun City, Jilin Province, died around November 2024, while serving an unknown prison term for refusing to give up his faith in Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.
It is unclear when Mr. Wang Ligong, who once worked at a research institute, was admitted to Gongzhuling Prison. An insider revealed that he had severe constipation in November 2024 and was given enemas several times in the prison hospital. He was then moved to the division for the elderly and infirm, where he had a brain hemorrhage and died in the prison hospital.
Mr. Wang’s ordeal began on May 18, 2023, when he was seized by plainclothes officers as he left his apartment building. They snatched his key and raided his home. They confiscated dozens of Falun Gong books, three computers, three printers, and Falun Gong informational materials.
During the raid, the police didn’t produce a search warrant, and they kept Mr. Wang and his 74-year-old wife, Ms. Gong Shuying, in separate rooms. They asked which items belonged to each one of them. The couple refused to answer, so the police ended up counting things seized from Ms. Gong’s room as hers and Mr. Wang’s room as his.
The two were taken to the Nanhu Police Station and held for two days, during which time they were taken to Jilin Province First Hospital and Changchun City Hospital for physical exams. Both hospitals deemed the couple to be in poor health and unfit for detention.
The police were going to try a third hospital on May 20, 2023, but changed their minds. They released Mr. Wang on bail that day after forcing him to first pay 3,000 yuan and then another 2,000 yuan (without issuing any receipts) to cover the costs of his and his wife’s medical exams and detention. Meanwhile, they admitted Ms. Gong to the Changchun City Detention Center in Xinglongshan Town.
Mr. Wang later went to the Nanhu Police Station to ask about the status of his wife’s case. It took him a few trips to get hold of the officer in charge, who informed him that the police had submitted his wife’s case to the Chaoyang District Procuratorate on May 26, 2023. While he himself had been put on bail, he wasn’t given any formal notice to that effect.
Mr. Wang hired a lawyer to represent his wife. When the lawyer went to the detention center on July 3, 2023, to visit her, the guards demanded to see notices from his local justice bureau and the Nanhu Police Station approving him to represent a Falun Gong practitioner.
The lawyer argued that there was no law requiring such notices. The guards replied that it was a policy from the Changchun City Political and Legal Affairs Committee, an extra-judicial agency tasked with overseeing the persecution of Falun Gong. They, however, could not produce a document verifying that.
The lawyer went to the Changchun City Procuratorate to file a complaint against the detention center. The procuratorate sided with the detention center. Mr. Wang called the mayor’s hotline on July 4 and 5, 2023, and was told that the lawyer had to meet the detention center’s requirements before being granted any meetings with his client.
Four men seized Mr. Wang from his home at around 10 a.m. on August 26, 2023. He and his wife were later both sentenced to prison. Details of their indictments, trials, and prison terms are unknown. Mr. Gong was admitted to Gongzhuling Prison, where he died around November 2024. It is unclear where his wife was taken to serve time.
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