80-year-old Woman to Be Tried for Her Faith in Falun Gong

(Minghui.org) An 80-year-old woman in Guangzhou City, Guangdong Province, is facing trial for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Ms. Zhao Ying was arrested on April 26, 2021. The police ransacked her home that evening, when her husband, who has Alzheimer’s disease and is in his 80s, was at home alone.

When the police took her for a physical exam, she was found to have a severe medical condition, but they still made three unsuccessful attempts over the next three days to get her admitted to the local detention center.

The police initially informed Ms. Zhao’s son to pick her up on the evening of April 29, but they changed their mind after her son waited for hours at the police station.

On May 1, officers took Ms. Zhao to the police hospital. Every room in the hospital has two surveillance cameras, and the lights are on all the time. Ms. Zhao was monitored around the clock, including when she was sleeping, using the restroom, or taking a shower. She was also forced to wear shackles and an inmate’s uniform.

After ten days at the hospital, Ms. Zhao was transferred to the detention center, which accepted her this time. She had persistent dangerously high blood pressure for the next two days, so the detention center decided to release her on bail around midnight on May 14.

In May and August 2021, a police officer surnamed Zhao went to Ms. Zhao’s home twice to interrogate her.

On July 24, 2022, a prosecutor with the Haizhu District Procuratorate called Ms. Zhao and asked her to confirm three things: whether she distributed Falun Gong materials in the Tangyayuan subdivision, whether she placed Falun Gong materials in people’s bike baskets, and whether she had ever been sentenced for practicing Falun Gong. Ms. Zhao denied all three and said they were fabricated by the police. The prosecutor said he would follow up with her in two days, but Ms. Zhao never heard back.

Five months later on December 8, a Haizhu District Court representative called Ms. Zhao’s family and said that she had been indicted by the Haizhu District Procuratorate. The representative showed the family her indictment in a video call on December 13, 2022, but never delivered a hard copy. She is now facing trial.

Past Persecution

Ms. Zhao used to be a manager at the Bank of China in Huaian City, Jiangsu Province. She started to practice Falun Gong in January 1997 and credits it for improving her health and mental well-being.

On July 19, 1999, the eve before the communist regime officially ordered the persecution of Falun Gong, Ms. Zhao and five other practitioners went to the provincial government in Jiangsu to speak up for the practice. They were arrested as soon as they arrived and held in custody for a day. Several hundred other practitioners were arrested around the same time for appealing for the right to practice Falun Gong.

Ms. Zhao and two others went to Beijing in March 2000 to appeal for Falun Gong. They were arrested on March 10 on their way to Tiananmen Square. They were taken to the Donghuamen Police Station and then transferred to the Ditan Police Station that evening. Later that night, they were taken to the Dongcheng District Detention Center in Beijing and interrogated.

Because practitioners from around the country had gathered in Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong, the detention center was extremely crowded and everyone had to sleep on their sides at night. After spending four days there, Ms. Zhao was taken back to Huaian and detained for 15 days.

Yang Jilin, the security director of her bank, detained Ms. Zhao in a guesthouse in September 2004 and arranged for a female colleague to monitor her every day. The police also came every day to interrogate her. A few days later, the police ransacked Ms. Zhao’s home and transferred her to a secret underground detention location. Eight men monitored her and deprived her of sleep for 130 hours. Her feet swelled so much that she could only fit into an 11.5 US-sized shoe. Ms. Zhao, then in her 60s, ended up in a delirious state.

Because Ms. Zhao’s son and daughter both worked in Guangzhou City, she later moved there from Huaian. In the second half of 2007, Fang Ke, the director of Huaian City 610 Office, led several officers to Guangzhou to the office of Ms. Zhao’s son, the president of a bank. The harassment put him under a lot of pressure. After that, the police and residential committee began to harass Ms. Zhao nonstop.

Qian Songqing, the residential committee director, and police officer Song Guangmin broke into Ms. Zhao’s home in Guangzhou in late June 2012 and confiscated her Falun Gong books, photo of Falun Gong’s founder, a new computer, printer, hard drive, and cellphone. Qian threatened to detain her in a brainwashing center.

In addition to arresting Ms. Zhao, the police also took her son and daughter to the police station for interrogation. Only after the detention center refused to accept her did the police release her on bail in the middle of the night.

Qian and Song and over 20 officers ransacked the homes of Ms. Zhao’s son and daughter at 7 a.m. on September 25, 2012. Ms. Zhao was also arrested. Despite her high blood pressure and high blood sugar, the police kept her in the brainwashing center while they lied to her family, saying that they took her to the hospital for advanced treatment.

Due to the abuse in the brainwashing center, Ms. Zhao grew so weak she had to lean against the wall to walk. Yet the police still interrogated her several times. She was indicted 87 days later, to be tried in the Tianhe District Court.

After she was released, she lived away from home for nearly a year to hide from the police. Unable to find her, the police often harassed her family and threatened to put her on the wanted list online. When the court later dismissed her case due to insufficient evidence, she returned home.

Ms. Zhao filed a criminal complaint against Jiang Zemin, the former head of the communist regime who ordered the persecution, in June 2015. One night in 2016, two officers knocked on her door and asked for her ID number. She refused to answer and asked the officers who they were. One said they were thereunder orders from police officer Cao Junhua. Then they left.

A man knocked on Ms. Zhao’s home on May 1, 2018, claiming that she had a gas leak. Ms. Zhao said that she wasn’t using any gas and wouldn’t open the door. Several officers then smashed her three locks and broke in. They confiscated more than ten Falun Gong books, a media player, and lecture videos.

One officer dragged her from the bed to the floor and then carried her to the sofa in the living room. She was later taken to the Tianhe District Police Department for interrogation and released on bail around midnight.

Perpetrators’ contact information:

Chen Cheng (陈程), prosecutor, Haizhu District Procuratorate: [phone], [phone]Mu Jian (穆健), president of Haizhu District Court: [phone]Guo Hua (郭华), director of Tianhe District Police Department: [phone]

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