Family Tragedy: Father Dies, Mother Sentenced, Son Tortured and Daughter Forced into Displacement

(Minghui.org) A 73-year-old Guan County, Shandong Province resident was recently sentenced to 15 months, two months after her arrest on May 13, 2022 for practicing Falun Gong.

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

Ms. Xu Jimei isn’t the only member of her family who has been targeted for their shared faith in Falun Gong. Two of her three children were also arrested at around the same time as she. Her son fell into critical condition after being tortured and is now denied visitation by the family. Her daughter has been forced to live away from home after she escaped from custody.

In addition, Ms. Xu’s husband suffered a heart condition induced by the persecution and had passed away in 2005.

Family’s Ordeal

Ms. Xu’s husband, Mr. Zhou Ziming, was a famous doctor of Chinese medicine in town. They had two sons and a daughter. Despite being a doctor himself, Mr. Zhou couldn’t cure his own and Ms. Xu’s ailments.

Ms. Xu suffered cervical vertebra hyperplasia, which caused inadequate blood and oxygen supply in her brain and the subsequent necrosis of some brain cells. Mr. Zhou struggled with severe coronary heart disease and myocardial infarction. His leg varicose veins were also very serious.

In the spring of 1995, the couple were introduced to Falun Gong. In a few days, both of their ailments disappeared and they regained health.

After witnessing their changes, their son Mr. Zhou Chunbao and daughter Ms. Zhou Chunling also took up the practice.

After the persecution began four years later, the elderly couple were subjected to constant harassment, home ransacking and extortion. The local police chief made random phone calls to them and asked for money from Mr. Zhou. Sometimes the couple were brought to the police station in the middle of the night for interrogation. At times, before one of them was released, the other was arrested.

The mental distress from the persecution took a toll on Mr. Zhou. His heart condition that was cured by Falun Gong relapsed. He passed away in 2005. He was 63.

A year later, Ms. Xu moved to Beijing to stay with her daughter. Because of talking to people about Falun Gong, she was arrested by officers from the Yongshun Police Station and given two years at the Hohhot Women’s Forced Labor Camp in the neighboring province of Inner Mongolia.

Ms. Xu returned to her hometown in Shandong after being released in 2008. She was arrested again in the spring of 2010 for talking to people about Falun Gong and sentenced to one year. Because of her seriously high blood pressure developed at the Guan County Detention Center, she was released on medical parole.

Ms. Xu was arrested yet another time in 2017, after being reported for distributing informational materials about Falun Gong. The police confiscated 7,000 yuan from her home. She was sentenced to one year at the Shandong Province Women’s Prison in Jinan City. She developed tuberculosis and stayed in the prison hospital for six months, until her term ended.

Also for distributing Falun Gong materials, Ms. Xu was arrested in late 2020. After she was released on bail after being rejected admission by the detention center over her high blood pressure, the police still submitted her case to the procuratorate and sought her prosecution.

The Guan County Court issued a subpoena for her arrest in early 2021. Upon learning that the police were planning to take her back into custody, Ms. Xu lived away from home and went into hiding.

On May 13, 2022, Chen Yong, an officer of Guan County Domestic Security Office, travelled nearby 800 miles to Fengcheng City, Liaoning Province and arrested Ms. Xu at her daughter’s home. Her daughter’s 10,000 yuan in cash was confiscated.

Ms. Zhou was also arrested by the police in Fengcheng for providing shelter to her mother. Her two cellphones, ID and bank deposit card were taken away.

The mother and daughter were taken back to Guan County on June 11. The police kept them handcuffed during the 15-hour trip.

Two days later, Ms. Zhou escaped from the detention facility when the police fell asleep and has been in hiding since. Ms. Xu remained in custody and was later sentenced.

Meanwhile, on May 15, two days after the mother and daughter’s arrests, Ms. Xu’s son, Mr. Zhou, a deputy director of Guan County Tax Bureau, was arrested. He was interrogated and deprived of sleep for three days. He held a hunger strike to protest the persecution and fell into a coma. He has been denied family visitation after being taken to the hospital for resuscitation. His family has been kept in the dark of his current situation. His wife and child are very worried about him.

Perpetrators’ contact information:

Zhang Xuehong (张学宏), secretary of Guan County Party Secretary: [phone]Zhang Zhigang (张志刚), magistrate of Guan County,: [phone]He Shuxia (何书侠), director of Guan County Domestic Security Office: [phone], [phone]

(More perpetrators’ contact information is available in the original Chinese article.)