(Minghui.org) A 46-year-old woman in Jilin City, Jilin Province, was admitted to Jilin Province Women’s Prison in the capital city of Changchun on October 13, 2023, to serve a four-year term for her faith in Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.
The authorities never notified Ms. Wang Chunling’s family of her case status. One of her friends found out about her sentence by chance when he recently went to the local detention center to visit her and the guards told him that she had been transferred to prison.
Ms. Wang’s sentencing stemmed from her arrest on January 3, 2022, for distributing Falun Gong materials. The police beat her and broke her thumb while attempting to get her fingerprints on some documents. She was detained for three months and released on bail. The police later deceived her into going to the local procuratorate to sign her case file. She was indicted and given a new one-year bail. She went out to distribute Falun Gong materials on May 4, 2023, only to be arrested again. Her friend recently went to the Jilin City Detention Center to deliver some necessities to her and was told that she had been transferred to prison on October 13.
Arrested Last January and Brutalized by Police
Ms. Wang went out to distribute Falun Gong informational materials on January 3, 2022, when a woman reported her. About four officers from the Xinghua Police Station in the Changyi District came to apprehend her. When she refused to go with them, one officer kicked her and pushed her inside their cruiser.
Ms. Wang was held in the Xinghua Police Station for nearly 30 hours. When she refused to answer their questions the next day, an officer slapped her in the face. Another one hit her in the abdomen and asked her if she believed in the Communist Party. She replied that she believed in Falun Gong’s teacher.
A young officer, Yang Zhongyu, ordered Ms. Wang to put her fingerprints on her case documents. When she refused, Yang summoned three more officers, who held her arms and hands and attempted to force her to fingerprint the documents. One officer used so much force that he broke her thumb. Only then did they stop.
That afternoon, the police grabbed Ms. Wang’s other hand and put her finger on the ink pad. Just as the police were forcing Ms. Wang to fingerprint the documents, Yang attempted to hit her hand. Ms. Wang managed to quickly pull her hand back, and Yang’s fist landed on the table so hard that he scraped of a large patch of skin. Yang also attempted to kick Ms. Wang’s leg, but to keep her balance, Ms. Wang stepped back right as she pulled her hand back, and Yang kicked the table leg instead. He screamed in pain.
Yang took Ms. Wang to the restroom, where there was no surveillance camera. He slapped her in the face and hit her in the chest and shoulder. He also ordered her to recite Falun Gong poems for three minutes. Suspecting that he was trying to record her voice, either to fabricate evidence against her or use it for surveillance, she didn’t comply.
The police later found Ms. Wang’s information in their database from an entry of an earlier arrest in 2020 and a ten-day detention. They called her husband, daughter, and mother-in-law to confirm her identity and then took her to the Jilin City Detention Center.
Three Months of Suffering at Detention Center
The detention center guards subjected Ms. Wang to intensive brainwashing aimed to force her to renounce Falun Gong. She held firm to her faith and was not allowed to do the Falun Gong exercises, talk, or shower. She had to seek permission before using the restroom.
Two months into her detention, Jilin City had an outbreak of COVID-19, and the already poor conditions became even worse. The food was sour and thick corn paste with some soup. Ms. Wang and many other inmates suffered from heartburn, vomiting, and constipation after eating it.
The guards took away all the bathroom tissue, so the inmates had to be creative to clean themselves after using the toilet. There was a surveillance camera in the bathroom.
Harassed after Release
Ms. Wang was released on bail on April 16, 2022. When the police took her home, they searched the place. They came back a few more times to harass her after that. Around mid-August 2022, two officers from the Shanqian Police Station in Longtan District knocked on her door. Only her daughter was home. The police left after failing to find Falun Gong items.
Indicted While on Bail
Ms. Wang’s family received a call from officer Yang in January 2023. He said they were returning the 1,000-yuan bail bond the family had paid for Ms. Wang and she should come to the police station to pick it up.
Ms. Wang went, only to be taken to the Changyi District Procuratorate by Yang. Prosecutor Li Xiaozhao ordered her to sign her case file but she refused. Li threatened her that she would have to make another trip to the procuratorate before they could return the money to her.
Yang called Ms. Wang again on February 6 and ordered her to report to the procuratorate. Ms. Wang went with her mother-in-law, but the older woman wasn’t allowed to go inside with her.
Prosecutor Li asked Ms. Wang if she pleaded guilty. She insisted that she didn’t violate any law and refused to sign anything. Her mother-in-law came into the room and told Li that her daughter-in-law was a wonderful person who treated her mother-in-law very well. Li told them to go home and come back the next morning.
Ms. Wang returned to the procuratorate with her daughter the next day. Li took them both to the Changyi District Court. Instead of returning the 1,000-yuan bail bond they’d promised, they ordered Ms. Wang to pay another 2,000 yuan and have her daughter sign her case file as a guarantor. If not, they would take her to the detention center.
Fearing that Ms. Wang would be detained, her daughter told them her phone number and signed her family name “Chen” on the document.
Ms. Wang was given two notices. One of them was an indictment from the Changyi District Procuratorate. Prosecutor Li accused her of not pleading guilty and recommended a four-year prison sentence. The court also issued a bail condition for a year and ordered her to report to the court whenever she was summoned. Ms. Wang was prohibited from traveling out of town as well.
Taken Back into Custody on May 4, 2023
Ms. Wang was arrested again on May 4, 2023, for distributing Falun Gong information. The arresting officers from the Xin’an Police Station in Longquan District took her to the Jilin City Detention Center.
There was no update from the authorities on her case. When a friend went to deliver things to her at the detention center recently, he learned that Ms. Wang had been transferred to the Jilin Province Women’s Prison on October 13, 2023. Her family was never notified of her trial (if any) and sentencing.
Past Persecution
Ms. Wang took up Falun Gong shortly after the onset of the persecution after witnessing how her mother, who had a hunchback and various ailments, stood up and became completely healthy after learning the practice. Living by Falun Gong’s principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance, she improved her character and became more considerate.
The local police deemed Ms. Wang a key target for persecution after discovering that she’d filed a criminal complaint in early 2015 against former Chinese dictator Jiang Zemin for ordering the persecution. Around July 2015, officer Li Yanchun of the Gangyao Town Police Station called her and threatened to arrest her for filing the complaint.
Every time the police were given orders to arrest a certain number of Falun Gong practitioners, they came for her. Sometimes they would stay outside her apartment building for several days in a row in an attempt to catch her when she left (since she refused to open the door). Officer Zhu Hongyu of the Gangyao Town Police Station showed up at her home on January 18, 2016. She was not there, so Zhu intimidated her father-in-law, who was.
During the 19th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in October 2017, the police harassed Ms. Wang at least five times. One time, they intimidated Ms. Wang’s husband when she wasn’t home. They ordered him to tell Ms. Wang to report to the police station and promised not to harass her anymore. Yet they didn’t stop and got in her way on her way home a few more times or parked their police car outside of her apartment building for hours on end. Ms. Wang was forced to live away from home to hide from the police, which really upset her husband and child.
Ms. Wang was reported to the property management for distributing Falun Gong materials in a neighborhood on November 10, 2020, and arrested. At the police station, she was tied up in a metal chair with her hands cuffed behind her back. The police grabbed her hair and took her photo. When she resisted the police’s order to fingerprint a document, they tried, without success, to force her into submission. They hurt her fingers.
She was arrested on November 10, 2021, for distributing Falun Gong informational materials and held at the Jilin City Lockup for ten days.
Related reports:
Beaten and Deceived by the Police, Jilin Woman Faces Trial for Her Faith in Falun Gong
Jilin Woman Detained for Two Weeks and Counting for Distributing Falun Gong Materials
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