Name: Zhang Changying (张嫦英)
Gender: Female
Age: 58
Address: Tongdao County, Hunan Province
Occupation: Retiree of Tongdao County Supply and Marketing Cooperative
Date of Most Recent Arrest: November 17, 2011
Most Recent Place of Detention: Huaihua Brainwashing Center (怀化洗脑班)
City: Huaihua
Province: Hunan
Persecution Suffered: Sleep deprivation, brainwashing, beatings, hung up, imprisonment, extortion

(Clearwisdom.net) Practitioner Ms. Zhang Changying, 58, is a retiree of the Tongdao County Supply and Marketing Cooperative in Hunan Province. Until 2011, she was forced to stay away from her own home for nine years in order to avoid harassment. On November 17, 2011, just one month after she returned home, Ou Guowei, head of the Tongdao County 610 Office, imprisoned her in the Huaihua Brainwashing Center. Guards in the brainwashing center hung her up by the handcuffs from December 2 to December 10. They also beat her during this time.

Torture re-enactment: Hanging by the handcuffs

After she had been displaced because of the persecution for nine years, Ms. Zhang returned home to reunite with her husband and daughter on October 20, 2011. When the county Political and Legal Committee and the 610 Office learned of her return, they reported to their superiors that they had found Ms. Zhang outside of the county.

Around 10:00 a.m. on November 17, 2011, Ou Guowei, Wu Xiaoling, officer Lu, and several others broke into Ms. Zhang's home and attempted to force her to write a “guarantee to no longer practice Falun Dafa.” However, Ms. Zhang refused. They then took her away for detention in the Huaihua Brainwashing Center.

Guards in the brainwashing center forced Ms. Zhang to watch videos slandering Falun Gong daily. They did not allow her to do the exercises, sit with her legs crossed in meditation, sleep, or bathe, and they gave her only one meal a day. The guards handcuffed her, hung her up, and beat her. When guard Liu slapped her across the face, she immediately heard buzzing in her ears.

From December 2 to December 10, the guards handcuffed Ms. Zhang with both hands behind her back, then hung her up by the handcuffs. Her toes barely touched the ground, and after some time her hands and feet turned blue, while the handcuffs cut so deeply into her wrists that her bones became visible. The wound was at first bleeding, and then it began draining pus. She suffered unbearable pain, and her hands and feet were constantly numb.

Ms. Zhang was tortured in the Huaihua Brainwashing Center for one month, from November 17 to December 16, 2011. The guards threatened to lock up her husband, daughter, and two sisters if she refused to write the three statements or be “reformed”.

Ms. Zhang has been detained repeatedly for practicing Falun Dafa.

In October 1999, she was detained for appealing for the right to practice Falun Dafa in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The Tongdao County Police Department imprisoned her for more than three weeks.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regards certain days of the year as sensitive dates. As each sensitive date approached in 2001 and 2002, police detained Ms. Zhang for one or two months.

On December 9, 2002, Li Tianxiong reported to Wang Wenchun, head of the county 610 Office, that Ms. Zhang had distributed Falun Dafa truth-clarification materials in the community. Wang led five officers to her home at around 10:00 a.m. They ransacked her home without a warrant and confiscated her Falun Dafa books and materials. To avoid further harassment, as well as getting her family involved, Ms. Zhang left home that night and stayed away for the next nine years.

The 610 Office of the Tongdao County Political and Legal Committee has been withholding her pension from the last nine years, totaling about 50,000 yuan (~7,920 USD). They claim that even if the pension was released to her, they would still deduct 10,000 yuan as a “deposit.”