(Minghui.org) A 71-year-old woman was secretly sentenced to five years in May 2021 for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Ms. Deng Tianyu, a Jingzhou City, Hubei Province resident, was arrested on April 14, 2020, for distributing informational materials about Falun Gong. Shortly after she was released at around 5 p.m., the police ransacked her home in the evening and confiscated her Falun Gong books, photo of Falun Gong’s founder and informational materials about Falun Gong.

The police put her under house arrest and arrested her again on October 18. She was first held at a detention center in Shishou City and then transferred to Jingzhou No.1 Detention Center on November 4.

Her family learned in May 2021 that she has been sentenced to five years, but the authorities kept them in the dark of when her hearing took place and when she was convicted.

This is the third time that Ms. Deng has been sentenced for her faith. She was first arrested on March 6, 2001, for distributing informational materials to expose the Tiananmen self-immolation hoax demonizing Falun Gong. The guards at the Sha City No.1 Detention Center beat her so hard that her retina fell out and her left eye became blind. The vision in her right eye also declined.

Ms. Deng was sentenced to three years in the Hubei Province Women’s Prison on December 14, 2001. The guards once forced her to stand for 15 days without drinking, sleeping, or using the restroom. In another torture session, they hung her up by the wrists to the window frame and exposed her to strong sunlight. She was also hung up to the beam of the prison cell with her toes barely touching the ground for seven days.

Ms. Deng was sentenced the second time, to four years following her other arrest on July 5, 2008. She was taken to the same Hubei Province Women’s Prison on May 12, 2009. The guards force-fed her with toxic drugs, which caused her to be in a temporary delirious state.

In February 2019, the Jingzhou City Social Security Office suddenly suspended Ms. Deng’s pension without providing an explanation.