(Minghui.org) A total of 1,358 Falun Gong practitioners from Cangzhou, Hebei Province have filed criminal complaints against Jiang Zemin between May 24 and August 18, 2015, according to reports compiled by the Minghui website.
The practitioners charge the former Chinese dictator with initiating the brutal suppression of Falun Gong and hold him responsible for the tremendous suffering inflicted upon them by his campaign. The criminal complaints were mailed to the Supreme People's Court and Supreme People's Procuratorate.
Many of these practitioners recounted how Falun Gong returned them to health and gave them a new outlook on life. Their dreams of living a healthier and happier life, however, were shattered when Jiang Zemin launched a nationwide campaign to eradicate the practice in 1999.
Simply for refusing to give up their belief, they were arrested, detained, tortured, and had their homes ransacked and personal belongings seized by the communist authorities. Many also saw their families implicated for their belief, while some were also forced to pay huge fines.
The Cangzhou practitioners who filed criminal complaints include people from all walks of life, including teachers, physicians, and farmers.
Below, we profile a few of these practitioners:
Mr. Ge Huaiqiang is a physician from a hospital in Cangzhou. During his detention at the Cangzhou City First Detention Center in 2003, he went on hunger strike multiple times. The monitors, which are inmates, tortured him by beating his stomach and abdomen, burning his toes with fire, and shaking his handcuffs, which caused his wrists to bleed. They beat Mr. Ge with a belt. Once, they hit him in the head, which caused a ruptured ear drum. He was deprived of sleep for about five days. He was forced to perform unpaid labor, and had to work sometimes until 2:00 a.m.
Mr. Ge was sentenced to four years of imprisonment on March 15, 2004. He was taken to Jidong Prison, where he was tortured. He was deprived of sleep for five days and nights. Sometimes he was forced to sit on a small stool facing the wall or stand for a long time. Guards and inmates beat his head and back with electric batons. The guards are denying family visits.
Ms. Wang Xiaohua was beaten multiple times by her husband, who was pressured by the authorities. Forced by the police, he gave a television interview to slander Falun Gong. He passed away at a young age.
Ms. Wang was arrested in the morning on January 18, 2008 and was detained at the Nanpi Detention Center. Police beat and handcuffed her to the ground for about four days. She went on a hunger strike for over 10 days and became very weak. She passed out often.
She was transferred to the Shijiazhuang Women’s Forced Labor Camp and forced to perform unpaid labor for 17 hours daily.
Ms. Cheng Guijun is from Dongguang County. Officials extorted 20,000 yuan from her. She was given forced labor twice, and was taken to the Kaiping Forced Labor Camp in Tangshan and the Gaoyang Forced Labor Camp.
She was taken to the Kaiping Forced Labor Camp on April 11, 2001. She was forced to stand for long hours, deprived of sleep, locked in a solitary cell, not allowed to use the rest room and forbidden to talk to others.
Then, she was transferred to the Gaoyang Forced Labor Camp in June 2001. Practitioners were stripped and searched. She was taken to a cell, her shoes and socks were removed and the guards pushed her down to the ground and handcuffed her to an iron ring. She could not move. Guards then shocked her feet and toes with electric batons.
Ten practitioners and Ms. Cheng were brainwashed in an office building in early July 2001. The room was cold and damp. They were forced to sit on small benches and could not move. Then, they were forced to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong and the founder of Falun Gong. If they moved, they were brutally beaten.
Ms. Cheng was arrested again on November 1, 2002. She was tied to an iron chair. Four to five people took turns to monitor her. They did not allow her to groom herself and deprived her of sleep. After five days and four nights, she was transferred to a detention center.
She was sentenced to two years of forced labor in December 2002 and taken to the Tangshan Forced Labor Camp. She was released on November 1, 2004.
While Ms. Cheng was detained, her son was mistreated. His teacher slapped his face, which caused him to go into a seizure. He died in June 2011. Her husband could not handle the pressure and divorced her.
In 1999, Jiang Zemin, as head of the Chinese Communist Party, overrode other Politburo standing committee members and launched the violent suppression of Falun Gong.
The persecution has led to the deaths of many Falun Gong practitioners in the past 16 years. More have been tortured for their belief and even killed for their organs. Jiang Zemin is directly responsible for the inception and continuation of the brutal persecution.
Under his personal direction, the Chinese Communist Party established an extralegal security organ, the “610 Office,” on June 10, 1999. The organization overrides police forces and the judicial system in carrying out Jiang's directive regarding Falun Gong: to ruin their reputations, cut off their financial resources, and destroy them physically.
Chinese law allows for citizens to be plaintiffs in criminal cases, and many practitioners are now exercising that right to file criminal complaints against the former dictator.