(Minghui.org) Three men and one woman from Sanhe, Hebei Province were arrested last April for sending group text messages to mobile phone users exposing the persecution of Falun Gong. Their six defense lawyers filed a joint complaint against a police officer last November for false imprisonment.

The four practitioners were arrested on April 22, 2014.

Though the Sanhe City Procuratorate twice returned the case to the police, citing insufficient evidence, it eventually forwarded the case to Sanhe City Court on December 19 under pressure from the 610 Office, an extralegal agency created with the sole purpose of eradicating Falun Gong. The court next tried to get the four Falun Gong practitioners to drop their lawyers, but they declined to do so.

Having received no official response after two months, one of the lawyers went to check on the status of their complaint on January 30, 2015. To his surprise, the Procuratorate denied receiving the complaint, even when presented with a signed receipt from the post office confirming the acceptance of the complaint document by the Procuratorate.

The lawyer suspected that this was simply a delay tactic and filed another complaint on site. The receptionist reluctantly accepted the lawyer's resubmission of the complaint, but denied that detaining the four practitioners beyond the legally permissible term was wrong.

The staff member refused to provide receipt of the latest complaint, even when the lawyer pointed out the legal provisions requiring the agency to do so when requested.

A judge involved in this case once admitted to the practitioners, “Everything has been arranged from above. This is just a formality.”

It became clear to the defense lawyers that the 610 Office has turned the court, the Procuratorate, and the police—agencies intentionally kept separate to prevent abuse of power—into a single entity to carry out the persecution of Falun Gong.

Though Mr. Ma Weishan and Mr. Kang Jingtai are awaiting trial at home, Mr. Wang Zhanqing and Ms. Wen Jie are still detained at Langfang Brainwashing Center, a facility shared with Langfang Detention Center (see photo below).

After the defense lawyers submitted the complaint against police officer Shi Liandong for the false imprisonment of their clients at the brainwashing center, the authorities removed the doorplate “Langfang Legal Education Center,” which is the official name for the brainwashing center (picture shown on the right). The remaining doorplate says “Langfang Detention Center.”

Related articles:
Human Rights Lawyers File Complaints Against Police Officer for False Imprisonment of Falun Gong PractitionersNearly 1,000 Sanhe Residents Petition for Falsely Accused Falun Gong Practitioners

Chief Perpetrators' Contact Information:
Shi Liandong (石连东), Domestic Security Division head: +86-316-3115636 (Home), +86-13832669588 (Cell)Jia Zhixue (贾志学), deputy head of Domestic Security Division: +86-316-3226297, +86-316-3212291 (Home), +86-13931603291 (Cell)Guo Lichen (国立臣), director of the 610 Office: +86-316-3175808 (Office), +86-316-3132359 (Home), +86-13603260114 (Cell), +86-15831606988 (Cell)Chen Aiguo (陈爱国), president of Sanhe City Court: +86-316-3308001 (Office), +86-13700368929 (Cell)Shi Shaolin (石少林), judge: +86-13831617176 (Cell)