(Minghui.org) An imprisoned man has been denied family visits since August after his wife and daughter demanded an investigation into the beatings he suffered for not renouncing his faith in Falun Gong. His wife filed a complaint against the prison with the Zhaoqing City Procuratorate in September over the fact that Mr. Zheng Minghui was tortured while he was incarcerated.
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual discipline based on the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.
Mr. Zheng Minghui and his wife, Ms. Peng Peishan, were arrested on March 23, 2016, for filing criminal complaints against former Chinese communist regime leader Jiang Zemin, who ordered the persecution of Falun Gong in July 1999.
Mr. Zheng and Ms. Peng were sentenced to 5 and 2 years in prison, respectively, by the Jinping District Court on November 10, 2017. They appealed, but the Shantou Intermediate Court upheld their sentences on December 19, 2017.
While Mr. Zheng was taken to Sihui Prison on January 16, 2018, his wife was released on March 23, 2018, after having already served two years in detention.
Ms. Peng visited her husband on April 3, 2018, but was blocked by an agent from the prison 610 Office, an extra legal agency created specifically to persecute Falun Gong.
She made another attempt one month later, on May 4. The same 610 Office agent attempted to obstruct her again, but he relented when her lawyer insisted on a meeting with Mr. Zheng.
Ms. Peng noticed that her husband was emaciated and groggy, with dark circles under his eyes. He told her that he'd been deprived of sleep after the prison authority began to force him to sit on a small stool for more than 10 hours without moving while watching propaganda videos attacking Falun Gong.
Shortly after her visit, Ms. Peng was told by the prison that she would be prohibited from visiting her husband between May 31 and December 31, 2018.
She later learned that Mr. Zheng started a hunger strike to protest the brainwashing. The guards ordered the inmates to beat him, leaving multiple injuries on his body, especially on his head.
When their daughter visited Mr. Zheng on June 22, he had been on the hunger strike for nearly 50 days and weighed less than 100 pounds.
The daughter noticed a scar on his forehead near his right eyebrow and a large area of bruises on his head and arm from the beatings. He also told her that his neck was injured and he suffered from severe pain and stiffness.
The prison guards threatened his daughter not to hire a lawyer for her father, nor to expose the persecution on the Internet.
Upon learning about Mr. Zheng's mistreatment, Ms. Peng went to the prison and questioned the guards. The officer who received her said he didn't know about the incident and would investigate it.
After more than one month of investigating, the prison informed Ms. Peng that Mr. Zheng suffered minor injuries because he accidentally bumped into a guard who tried to stop him from shouting “Falun Dafa is good.” The prison announced days later that no one would be allowed to visit Mr. Zheng as of August 1, 2018.
Background
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 over 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 the police force 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.
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