(Minghui.org) Plainclothes officers broke into 77-year-old Ms. Zhao Deqiong’s home at around 6:40 p.m. on March 2, 2021, and threatened to arrest her.
One officer called Ms. Zhao’s son-in-law and said to him, “Your mother-in-law’s practicing Falun Gong will affect your children's applications to colleges!” In a separate room, the officers also threatened Ms. Zhao’s husband, “Why did you buy stamps for your wife? It’s illegal! We could arrest you as well.”
Ms. Zhao, who lives in Nanchong City, Sichuan Province, realized that the police had found out about her mailing letters to the public to raise awareness about the persecution of Falun Gong, a mind-body practice also known as Falun Dafa. She told them that she used to have many ailments but fully recovered after she started to practice it. Because of Falun Gong’s popularity in China, the Chinese communist regime ordered the nationwide persecution in July 1999. Given its universal values of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance, Falun Gong is now embraced around the world, but it is still persecuted in its home country, China.
The police recorded her with their laptop and used that as evidence of Ms. Zhao’s promoting Falun Gong. They also ordered her to sign the document admitting that she “disrupted social order” by practicing Falun Gong. But she refused to comply.
Although the police left shortly after, they came back with a search warrant early the next morning and confiscated Ms. Zhao’s Falun Gong books and materials.
In the past few years, Ms. Zhao, who retired from the Nanchong Oil Refinery, has been repeatedly persecuted for her faith.
In 2009, Ms. Zhao wrote a letter of appeal to the Sichuan Appeals Office about how she’d been persecuted for practicing Falun Gong. The authorities threatened to sentence her to four years but relented as she was bedridden and in critical condition as a result of previous persecution.
After she recovered, she sometimes went to a local park to talk to people about Falun Gong. On July 24, 2011, she was reported by a little girl for telling her, “Falun Dafa is good, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good.”
The police arrested Ms. Zhao and held her in the Xishan Brainwashing Center, where she was tortured and became incontinent. Her children brought her home.
For the next few months, the authorities often went to Ms. Zhao’s home and attempted to force her to renounce Falun Gong.
When she repeatedly refused to comply, a dozen people, including the police, prosecutor, and judge, went to her home at around 3 p.m. on March 7, 2012. Standing in front of the bedridden and incapacitated woman, judge Xu Wenying told her to sit up to answer questions.
Xu declared that Ms. Zhao was guilty of “using a cult organization to undermine law enforcement,” the standard pretext used to charge Falun Gong practitioners. Xu said, “We will wait five minutes. If you cooperate, you will be allowed to delay your sentence for three years, and your salary will not be stopped. If you do not cooperate, you will be sentenced to three years in prison and your salary will be stopped.”
When Ms. Zhao didn’t respond, Xu announced at the end of five minutes that she’d agreed to the verdict.
Two officers returned at around 3:30 p.m. on July 28, 2015. They asked her daughter if Ms. Zhao had gone out recently. Her daughter responded that she was still bedridden and unable to go out. The police announced that Ms. Zhao’s term would be extended by six months and then left.
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Category: Accounts of Persecution
