(Minghui.org) Ms. Li Zhaoying from Jiayuguan City, Gansu Province, who was illegally arrested in April, was sentenced to three-and-a-half-years in prison and admitted to Gansu Women's Prison on December 22, 2014.

Ms. Li, 74, was arrested by plainclothes officers on the evening of April 4, 2014. They had monitored her for a period of time and arrested her while she was distributing informational materials about the persecution of Falun Gong. They took her to a nearby police station and interrogated her all night long.

Xu Zhengzhong (徐正中), director of the Jiayuguan City 610 Office, and several other officers ransacked Ms. Li’s home on April 5, 2014. They confiscated Falun Gong books, informational materials, and laptop computers. Ms. Li was released that day.

Ms. Li did not know that her daughter had signed the "awaiting trial" bail documents at the Xiongguan Police Department to secure her release. During the next six months, Ms. Li and her family were monitored by community officers, and, at one point, she was told to go to the police department to give her fingerprints.

Ms. Li's case was submitted to the Cheng District Procuratorate in Jiayuguan City on October 13, 2014. Prosecutor Yan Xinming (闫欣明) charged Ms. Li in Cheng District Court on October 23, 2014. He used her “conviction” in 2002--when she was illegally sentenced to a three-year forced labor term--and the informational materials the police had confiscated during her recent arrest as evidence against her.

She was tried in the Cheng District Court on November 12, 2014, and released afterwards. When the Court issued the verdict on December 3, 2014, Ms. Li was forced to put her fingerprints on it and, at the court's insistence, on three sheets of blank paper. She was taken to the Jiayuguan Detention Center on December 16, 2014, before being transferred to prison a week later.

Parties involved in persecuting Ms. Li:
Ru Zuoxun (茹作勋), chief justice, Jiayuguan City Intermediate Court
Zhang Jingchang (张静昌), secretary of Jiayuguan City
Chang Shouyuan (常守远), deputy mayor of Jiayuguan City and director of the Jiayuguan City Police Department
Chen Xiquan (陈锡泉), director of the Jiayuguan City Detention Center