Former Teacher Secretly Sentenced to Prison for Her Faith

(Minghui.org) A Harbin City, Heilongjiang Province resident has been denied family visits since her arrest one and a half years ago for practicing Falun Gong. Her family recently confirmed that she has been secretly sentenced to three years and has already been transferred to a local prison.

Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual and meditation discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Ms. Meng Lichun, a former middle school teacher, was arrested on October 10, 2019 after being followed by the police. She was detained at the Harbin City No. 2 Detention Center and denied family visits.

Her family recently went to the detention center again, trying to visit her. The guards told them she was no longer there, but refused to provide more information about her. Her family then went to the Harbin Women’s Prison, which also denied that she was on their list of detainees. When her family went to the local police station, the officers also refused to provide any information. 

With her family’s repeated inquires, a detention center guard finally told them that Ms. Meng has been sentenced to three years and taken to the Harbin Women’s Prison. It’s not clear whether the prison guards were lying to her family when they said she wasn’t there, or whether she indeed has been transferred to another detention facility. 

Past Persecution

Prior to her latest sentencing, Ms. Meng was arrested in the spring of 2000 for going to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. She was taken back to Harbin and held at the Yilan County Detention Center for 21 days. Because she refused to write a statement renouncing Falun Gong, her principal suspended her from teaching duties and then used it as an excuse to stop her salary, despite the fact that Ms. Meng requested several times to go back to work.

Ms. Meng was given three years at the Wanjia Forced Labor Camp in 2000. She was also demoted from a middle school teacher to teaching at an elementary school. 

Ms. Meng was arrested again in 2017 and held briefly in custody. After she was released, the police kept coming back to harass her. She moved back to her hometown in Shuangyashan City in the same province, but the police still called her to harass her over the phone.