Name: Wu Guangyu(吴光玉)
Gender: Female
Age: 60
Address: Maijia Township, Baiyun District, Guiyang City, Guizhou Province (贵州省贵阳市白云区麦架乡)
Occupation: Farmer
Date of Most Recent Arrest: December 8, 2003
Most recent place of detention: Guizhou Zhongba Women's Forced Labor Camp (贵州中八女子劳教所)
City: Guiyang
Province: Guizhou
Persecution Suffered: Detention, home ransacked, interrogation, food and drink deprivation, forced labor reform, brutal beatings, handcuffed behind the back, forced labor
(Minghui.org) After Ms. Wu Guangyu started to practice Falun Gong, all of her illnesses disappeared. She was then arrested by the police and detained in a forced labor camp for more than three years because she practices Falun Gong. She was brutally tortured in the forced labor camp. While she was detained, her husband passed away.
Before she practiced Falun Gong, Ms. Wu Guangyu, 60, had difficulty walking because she had poliomyelitis at a young age. She also suffered from many illnesses. For many years she felt a tightness in her chest, as if a heavy slab was on it. Her breathing was difficult and very painful. Because she could not afford it, she did not go to the hospital for treatment. Her husband had a mental disorder and her three daughters were in school. Under such a difficult situation, she felt very fortunate to start practicing Falun Dafa in March 1997. Ms. Wu was illiterate and made her living working in the fields. But she was not afraid of hardship. She actively attended Fa study and did exercises in a group. Soon all of her illnesses disappeared.
Arrested Twice
On an early May morning of 2003, as she posted Falun Gong materials on the outside yard wall of a household in a local village, Ms. Wu was arrested by police who were laying in wait. The police searched her home and confiscated all of her Falun Dafa books and materials. Ms. Wu was detained in the detention center for more than two weeks. During that period, her husband's mental illness worsened and he depended on their youngest daughter to care for him day and night. No one did the work in the fields. Her husband and daughter had no money to live on. Her daughter was terrified and felt hopeless.
On December 8, 2003, Ms. Wu visited relatives in the Yanzikou District, Bijie. When she was at the store run by her younger brother at noontime, two female students entered the store and asked her for Falun Dafa materials. Ms. Wu did not think too much about it and gave some to each of them. Half an hour after they left, five policemen arrived and arrested Ms. Wu. She was taken to the police station and body-searched. The police found several copies of Falun Dafa materials on her. She was then immediately transferred to the Bijie Police Department. It was apparent this had been a trap set by the police department. Nie Zhongyi led a dozen policemen to interrogate her. They threatened her to disclose the source of the Falun Dafa materials. Ms. Wu said she picked up the materials on a bus when she came to Bijie. The police did not believe her. For the next three days, they continued to interrogate her and deprived her of food.
Ms. Wu was detained in the Bijie Police Department from December 8 to 22, 2013. Because of insufficient evidence, the police department decided to release her and gave her a “release letter”. As she was about to leave, Ni Zhongyi suddenly changed his mind and transferred her to the Bijie Drug Rehabilitation Center for forced labor.
Warden of Drug Rehabilitation Center: “I would have no problem beating her to death.”
While in the Bijie Drug Rehabilitation Center, Ms. Wu did not yield, and shouted loudly. She tried to reason with her captors. However, Yang Yingzhi, Warden of the Drug Rehabilitation Center, ordered the guards to brutally beat, hit, and kick her and strike her head. Yang stood nearby and shouted: “Beat her. I would have no problem beating her to death.” The guards also shouted: “It is not against the law to beat those who practice Falun Gong to death.” After brutally beating Ms. Wu, the guards handcuffed her hands behind her back and forced her to stand at the edge of a bed for more than ten hours.
The guards said, “There will be no meals for you because our superiors have no funds for those who practice Falun Gong.” Other detainees shared some of their food with her every day when they saw her situation. This treatment continued for four months until she left the drug rehabilitation center in April 2004. Ms. Wu was then transferred to the Zhongba Women's Forced Labor Camp in April 2004 for a three-year term.
Enslaved in the forced labor camp
The new arrival division of Zhongba Forced Labor Camp detained about 80 people, most of them Falun Gong practitioners. Guards ordered drug addicts to monitor the practitioners. They forced Falun Gong practitioners to obey camp rules and do hard labor with no time to rest and no days off. All personal freedom was denied. Even use of the restroom was limited. A practitioner had to report first and get permission to use the toilet. They were constantly watched and could only go one at a time. Their monthly payment for working in the camp was two rolls of toilet paper. Practitioners were forced to write “transformation letters” every three months.
Ms. Wu witnessed many times that Ms. Zhou Xianzhu, in her 40s, from Qing Town was often tortured because she refused to write “transformation letters” or do hard labor. Ms. Zhou was often forced to stand in a dark, narrow corner for several days and nights. Her legs and feet swelled up. She fainted several times and later disappeared without a trace. Ms. Yi Zhe, who was forced to sweep the floor every day, whispered to Ms. Wu that she only saw Ms. Zhou's quilt and clothes when she cleaned the room where Ms. Zhou stayed. One day, Ms. Wu asked guard Yuan why Zhou Xianzhu had disappeared. The guard looked nervous and then said, “Don't ask. Take care of yourself instead.” To date, Ms. Zhou's whereabouts are still unknown.
Ms. Wu was tortured during more than three years of detention, and difficult times also visited her family. Her husband's mental illness seriously worsened and he passed away. During her incarceration, crops from the fields Ms. Wu worked were never harvested for her family.
When sending much-needed clothing to her mother in prison, her youngest daughter slipped a note in one of the pieces. It said: “Mom, can you tell us if you are being tortured? Do you have any idea how my sisters and our sick father have been living all this time?”
