(Minghui.org) A 59-year-old woman in Luzhou City, Sichuan Province lost her appeal against a wrongful conviction on April 11, 2023, and is now serving 3.5 years at the Longquan Women’s Prison located in the capital city of Chengdu.
Ms. Yang Taiying was arrested on March 5, 2022, for talking to people about the Chinese Communist Party’s persecution of her faith, Falun Gong, a mind-body practice based on the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. The arresting officers included Li Xiongming from the Naxi District Domestic Security Office, who has been actively participating in the persecution over the years.
Prosecutors Yan Lan and Yang Xin of the Naxi District Procuratorate indicted Ms. Yang. The Naxi District Court heard Ms. Yang’s case on August 4 and again on August 26, 2022. Judge Zheng Yujing presided over the trials. Judges Ma Dequan and Han Liping, as well as assistant to judges, Yan Feifei, and clerk Ma Zhen, were also present.
Ms. Yang’s two lawyers entered a not-guilty plea for her as no law in China criminalizes Falun Gong. She also testified in her own defense. The court sentenced her to 3.5 years with a 5,000-yuan fine on December 30, 2022. Ms. Yang filed an appeal and the Luzhou City Intermediate Court ruled on April 11, 2023, to uphold her original verdict.
The ruling was issued by presiding judge Lei Gang, who also rejected at least 12 other practitioners’ appeals since 2006. Judges Li Ruiliang and Xu Zhihong’s names appeared in the ruling against Ms. Yang as well. Both Li and Xu have also taken part in turning down many other practitioners’ appeals since 2012.
Ms. Yang was admitted to the Longquan Women’s Prison after her appeal was rejected, though the exact time of her prison transfer remains to be investigated.
This is not the first time that Ms. Yang has been targeted for practicing Falun Gong. She was given two labor camp terms totaling 3.5 years between 2000 and 2004. She was arrested again in 2013 and sentenced to 4.5 years by the Jiangyang District Court. She was subjected to various forms of torture in the same Longquan Women’s Prison where she is being jailed now. She was fired by her workplace and also deprived of a pension after she finished serving her first prison sentence.
Health Restored and Character Improved
Ms. Yang detailed in her appeal how Falun Gong transformed her life and reiterated that the practice brings nothing but benefits to its practitioners and society at large.
Ms. Yang landed an accounting job at the Naxi District Agricultural Machinery Bureau after graduating from college in 1985. Everything went smoothly in the first few years of her job, but not long after she turned 30 in 1994, her fate suddenly changed for the worse, with her struck with severe illnesses, including enteritis, hyperlipidemia, kidney failure, blood in the stool, and back pain. She tried both Western and Chinese medicine, but nothing helped.
Her symptoms worsened in 1997 and she struggled to perform her job functions. Her supervisor urged her to complete all her tasks during the year-end closing (a final step of the annual financial reporting process). She asked to work from home as her back hurt so much that she could neither stand nor sit. She managed to complete her work while lying in bed. Her mother moved in with her and took care of her for ten straight months.
Ms. Yang said she couldn’t accept the reality. She didn’t want to die but also felt hopeless. Then she learned that a colleague of hers, as well as a local physician, both contracted similar diseases but miraculously recovered without medical treatment after they took up Falun Gong. She was stunned but skeptical of Falun Gong’s healing power.
However, she still decided to give Falun Gong a try as she had no other options to get better. After she read Zhuan Falun, the main teachings of Falun Gong, for the first time, she was in awe of the profound principles in the book. She came to see that there was a reason behind everything, including her diseases. She learned to follow the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance to conduct herself.
Ms. Yang’s diseases disappeared in less than one month of her Falun Gong practice. She said she also began to reflect on herself as an accountant. When she started her job in 1985, she discovered that corruption was rampant in the accounting field. She initially detested it but gradually followed suit. After she took up Falun Gong, she realized she could no longer be corrupt. She returned the kickbacks and gifts others gave her in the past and strictly required herself to follow all the laws, regulations, and rules. Some of her colleagues began to do the same upon witnessing her changes. She also advised her husband and child to be upright people.
In her appeal, Ms. Yang also said that Falun Gong has spread far and wide around the world and received numerous awards outside of China. The former dictator, Jiang Zemin, launched the persecution in 1999 out of his jealousy of Falun Gong’s ever-increasing popularity. He then fabricated lies to demonize Falun Gong and utilized the state apparatus to try to crush Falun Gong. Countless Falun Gong practitioners were arrested, tortured or even had their organs harvested for upholding their faith.
Despite the terror of the persecution, Ms. Yang said she and other Falun Gong practitioners persisted in raising awareness of the persecution because they wanted the best for everyone and didn’t want to see their fellow Chinese being held responsible for blindly following the communist regime to target law-abiding practitioners.
Falun Gong also shattered her atheist mindset, said Ms. Yang, after she personally experienced many extraordinary things from the practice, including her miraculous recovery from her illnesses. She deeply believes that good and evil will be rewarded accordingly. Those who follow the regime to commit crimes against Falun Gong practitioners will be held responsible sooner or later. She urged the intermediate court to uphold justice for Falun Gong practitioners like her.
Related reports:
Sichuan Woman Sentenced to 3.5 Years for Her Faith in Falun Gong
Sichuan Falun Gong Practitioners Face Economic Persecution
Dr. Li Yanjun and Ms. Yang Taiying Secretly Tried in Sichuan Province
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