(Clearwisdom.net) Two Falun Gong practitioners were arrested in May 2011 from Daiwangcheng Town in Wei County, Hebei Province. They were sent to a brainwashing center. Their families contacted various government agencies in the past month, including Daiwangcheng Town, Wei County, and the Zhangjiakou City 610 Office. The families also strongly opposed financial extortion. Both practitioners were recently released.

Several police cars came to Yi Village and Majiazhai Village, which is less than one third of a mile from Yi Village, on May 18, 2011 at 5:00 a.m. and arrested practitioners Ms. Cai Jinzhi and Mr. Xiao Tang. The officials involved were from the Wei County 610 Office, the Wei County Domestic Security Division, Daiwangcheng Town, Yi Village and Majiazhai Village.

Ms. Cai and Mr. Xiao were taken to a detention center in Zhangjiakou City at 11:00 a.m. that day. Over the course of the twelve-year persecution of Falun Gong, these two practitioners have on many occasions been detained, illegally fined, sentenced to forced and forced to become homeless.

Immediately, the families of both practitioners went to the Daiwangcheng Town government demanding their release. They said, “Why did you arrest our family members? They are good people and there is nothing wrong with following the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.” An official threatened, “I will arrest all of you one by one, and punish you!”

But the two families were not intimidated, and on the next day, they went to the Wei County 610 Office. Director Chang Yongbao was too intimidated to meet them.

The families later went to the Daiwangcheng Town government and the Wei County 610 Office again to ask about the arrest order. The officials there could they provide an answer. In the end, 610 Office director Chang said, “The order was from higher officials.”

Later, the families of Ms. Cai and Mr. Xiao went to the Zhangjiakou City Law Enforcement Administration (where the 610 Office brainwashing center is located) and asked for the practitioners’ release. An official there said, “It is the officials from Wei County and Daiwangcheng Town who wanted to arrest them. Wei County officials paid us 10,000 yuan to detain them.” That official continued, “Wei County officials put these two people here and did not follow up. We already notified them to come pick them up, but they ignored us. If they still do not come, we will release the two practitioners tomorrow.”

Thus, the Zhangjiakou City Law Enforcement Administration notified the Wei County 610 Office to pick up the practitioners. However, the officials from the Wei County 610 Office were afraid that they would have to pay more, so they told the Daiwangcheng Town officials to pick them up. The Daiwangcheng Town officials in turn asked the two practitioners’ families to pay 5,000 yuan each.

The practitioners' family members said, “It is you who illegally arrested our family members. How can you still extort money from us? Do you think we are willing to pay you to persecute our family members?” Seeing the resistance, Daiwangcheng Town officials asked Majiazhai Village Party Secretary to pick up Mr. Xiao.

When Mr. Xiao’s family picked him up, they found him very skinny from the past twenty days of detention and abuse. His son told the Daiwangcheng Town officials angrily, “See what you have done to my father! Just you try to arrest him again!” Daiwangcheng Town officials repeatedly said, “No, this will not happen again.”

When the Daiwangcheng Town officials asked for 5,000 yuan from Majiazhai Village for Mr. Xiao, Yi Village officials did not want to meet the same situation so they notified Ms. Cai’s family to pick her up themselves. When Ms. Cai’s family went to pick her up, she was very weak and her skin was reddish. Her child went to Chang and said angrily, “How can you persecute my mother like this? I will go to your children and ask them how their father can do such bad deeds.” Chang was speechless and slunk away.

Not surprisingly, the Daiwangcheng Town officials also asked the Yi Village party secretary to pay 5,000 yuan. The party secretary said, “It is you who arrested her and it is you who paid Zhangjiakou City officials earlier. Why do you ask for the money from us?”

In the end, nobody wanted to pay the money. When the Daiwangcheng Town officials followed the communist regime to persecute Falun Gong practitioners, they did not expect such an outcome.

Regime officials from both Daiwangcheng Town and Majiazhai Village were afraid that the incident of the 5,000 yuan would be exposed. They feared letting others know that they are using taxpayers’ money to persecute Falun Gong, knowing that the village residents would end up truly hating them.