86-year-old Man Dies Days Before Finishing Wrongful Prison Term for Practicing Falun Gong

(Minghui.org)

Name: Li PeigaoChinese Name: 李培高Gender: MaleAge: 86City: KunmingProvince: YunnanOccupation: EngineerDate of Death: January 4, 2023Date of Most Recent Arrest: January 2019Most Recent Place of Detention: Yunnan Province No.1 Prison

An 86-year-old Kunming City, Yunnan Province resident died on January 4, 2023, days before he finished serving a four-year term for practicing Falun Gong.

Mr. Li Peigao retired from Yunnan Construction Installation Company as a senior engineer in 1994 and lived alone. Shortly after he learned Falun Gong in March 1996, his chronic diarrhea of over 20 years and the swelling and inflammation of his prostate disappeared. He followed the teachings of Falun Gong, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, and became completely healthy and energetic.

After the Chinese communist regime began to persecute Falun Gong in July 1999, Mr. Li was repeatedly targeted for his faith. He was held in a brainwashing center three times, arrested a dozen times, and had his home ransacked seven times. When he wasn’t incarcerated, the police monitored and followed him, tapped his phone, and summoned him for questioning.

Mr. Li’s latest sentencing resulted from his arrest on November 26, 2015 together with two other practitioners, Ms. Ji Fuxian and Ms. He Shuangfeng. Due to his advanced age, he was soon released on bail.

The Xishan District Court held a joint hearing of all three practitioners’ cases on September 8, 2016. Mr. Li recounted how his chronic diarrhea disappeared after practicing Falun Gong and that he tried to be a good person by following Falun Gong’s principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. The judge kept interrupting him and didn’t allow him to finish. He was sentenced to four years on October 8, 2016. Mr. Li appealed with the Kunming City Intermediate Court, which ruled to uphold his original verdict.

The police arrested Mr. Li two more times, on September 15 and November 24, 2018, respectively, for distributing informational materials about Falun Gong. The police ransacked his home both times and released him hours later.

Mr. Li handed out Falun Gong calendars and pamphlets to others in late November 2018. Officers from Jinbilu Police Station arrested him on November 24 that year. He was released the same evening after officers from Xishan Domestic Security Office ransacked his home.

He was taken to the Yunnan Province Prison to serve time in January 2019 and denied family visitation since.

According to inmates who were released before him, Mr. Li had good health in the prison and it was shocking that he suddenly died, just days before he was to be released. The prison claimed that he died of illness, but didn’t provide any further information to his family.

Past Persecution

A few days after the persecution started, three officers took Mr. Li to Xiba Police Station when he did the Falun Gong exercises outdoors on July 24, 1999. He refused to stop practicing Falun Gong after an officer from Kunming Police Department warned him to renounce his faith. The officer took him home and confiscated his Falun Gong books and exercise tapes.

Two officers broke into Mr. Li’s home when he was meditating in the evening of October 28, 1999. They took him to Xiba Police Station to interrogate him and forced him to sign the deposition.

An officer from Wuhua District Police Department summoned Mr. Li seven times in October 1999 and interrogated him. One time three officers went to his home to question if he still practiced Falun Gong.

Two officers from Kunming City Police Department ransacked his place on November 8, 2000, and confiscated his exercise tape.

Several officers from Binchuan County Police Department in Dali City arrested Mr. Li when he told others about the persecution on March 27, 2001. They interrogated him, ransacked his place, and locked him in Binchuan County Detention Center for a month. He only got to go home after his family paid the officers 2,000 yuan.

Two officers from Kunming City Police Department broke into his home one day in May 2002, and wrote a search warrant right then and there. With the warrant they ransacked his home for three hours. They confiscated his Falun Gong books and literature, a notebook computer, and an audio player. They took him to the police department and two doctors took his blood pressure. His blood pressure became extremely high and he passed out while using the restroom. The police insisted that his blood pressure was stable and interrogated him until midnight. He went home that day but the next few days the officers continued coming to his home to harass him and search his home.

An official from his former employer came to his home and arbitrarily announced that he’d take “temporary custody” of him. Mr. Li had to report to the official if he wanted to leave home. This lasted over a year.

Mr. Li’s former employer, officials from the residential commission, and officers from Wuhua District Domestic Security worked together to put him in a brainwashing center three times in Hangkong Nursing Home in Kunming City.

The Wuhua District 610 Office ordered Mr. Li’s former employer to take him to a nursing home in August 2001. The head of the 610 Office held a ten-day brainwashing session in the nursing home, and twelve Falun Gong practitioners were forced to attend. The practitioners were forced to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong.

Mr. Li’s former coworkers worked with people from the Zhuantang Residential Commission to take him to the nursing home again in August 2003. The practitioners there all attended the previous brainwashing session and refused to renounce Falun Gong.

The 610 Office, Wuhua Procuratorate, and Wuhua Domestic Security Office held a nine-day brainwashing session in the nursing home in July 2005. They coerced Mr. Li to attend.

During the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the Chinese communist regime launched a mass arrest of Falun Gong practitioners. Officers from the Daguan Police Station and Wuhua District Domestic Security went to Mr. Li’s home on the evening of June 21, 2008, pretending to want to learn the Falun Gong exercises. One officer dragged him into his bedroom, while the other officers called in a dozen more officers to ransack his place. They confiscated his Falun Gong books, computer, two printers, paper cutters, an e-book reader, and a mobile hard drive. A prosecutor indicted him, and a judge in Kunming City Intermediate Court sentenced him to three years in prison in 2009.

When Mr. Li gave out DVDs with information about Falun Gong in May 2012, he happened to give one to a plainclothes officer. The officer took him to the Chongren Police Station to interrogate him. Other officers ransacked his place. He was released one hour later.

Mr. Li’s next arrest was on March 8, 2013 after being reported for distributing Falun Gong materials. He was released on bail after his family paid a 1,000-yuan bond.

He was arrested again on May 1, 2013, also for distributing Falun Gong materials. He was interrogation in the police station for hours.

Perpetrators’ contact information:

Li Hua (李华), president of Yunnan Province No.1 Prison: [phone]Zhao Yi (赵毅), director of Yunnan Province Prison Administration Bureau: [phone]Li Hui (李辉), director of Xishan District Police Station: [phone]Yang Yue (杨越), president of Xishan District CourtOu Lingjun (欧灵军), president of Xishan District Procuratorate: [phone], [phone]

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

Related report:

86-year-old Retired Engineer Serving Three-year Term, Denied Family Visits