(Minghui.org) Three Tieling City, Liaoning Province residents were sentenced to prison on June 29, 2020 for their faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual and meditation discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Ms. Liu Yuhua was sentenced to four years and fined 5,000 yuan. Her husband, Mr. Jin Liguo, received one year with a 1,000-yuan fine. The couple’s friend, Ms. Zhang Lizhen, was sentenced to three months and fined 1,000 yuan.
Ms. Liu and Mr. Jin were arrested at home on October 9, 2019, by more than a dozen armed police officers after being reported for mailing letters about Falun Gong to local judiciary agencies. Another two practitioners, Ms. Zhang Xuehua and Ms. Zhang Lizhen (no relation), who happened to be visiting the couple, were also arrested.
The three female practitioners were sent to Tieling City Detention Center in the afternoon, and Mr. Jin was taken to Changtu County Detention Center around 9 p.m.
Ms. Zhang Xuehua was coerced by the police into writing a statement to renounce Falun Gong and was cleared of prosecution.
The other three practitioners appeared in Changtu County Court on May 19, 2020. The prosecution witnesses, including the police officers involved in their arrests and the postal workers who reported them, did not appear during the hearing.
Liaoning Couple and a Friend Tried for Their Faith, Prosecution's Witnesses Absent from Hearing