(Minghui.org) A 70-year-old Yushu City, Jilin Province resident was sentenced to three years and two months and fined 10,000 yuan on August 19, 2024 for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Ms. Zhang Shuhua was initially arrested on the morning of August 12, 2022, by several plainclothes officers. She was released that afternoon, only to be arrested again weeks later on August 30 and taken to the Changchun City Fourth Detention Center. The Yushu City Procuratorate decided not to issue a formal arrest and ordered Ms. Zhang to pay 2,000 yuan before releasing her. The money was later returned to her.
The Yushu City Procuratorate summoned Ms. Zhang on October 26, 2022 and arrested her upon her arrival. She developed illness symptoms in detention and was released on bail in early 2023.
The Dehui City Procuratorate later took over the case and issued a formal arrest warrant for Ms. Zhang around September 1, 2023. Both Dehui and Yushu are under the administration of Changchun (the capital city of Jilin Province).
The Yushu City Police Department was tasked with monitoring Ms. Zhang. They later took her for a physical examination and she was deemed unfit for detention. The local detention center refused to admit her.
Ms. Zhang was arrested again at around 7 p.m. on December 23, 2023, after the police alleged that a surveillance camera recorded her and another Falun Gong practitioner, Ms. Liu Guilan, distributing Falun Gong informational materials in a residential area.
The local lockup declined to admit Ms. Zhang after she failed the required physical examination. The arresting officers from the Zhengyang Police Station released her on bail but kept Ms. Liu at the lockup for 13 days before transferring her to a local detention center on January 5, 2024. Ms. Liu remained in detention and was later sentenced to eight months.
Captain Yan Guohui and deputy captain Yang Shucai of the Yushu City Police Department visited Ms. Zhang at home on January 5, 2024 and notified her that she had been formally placed on bail pending trial.
Yan and Yang came again at 8 a.m. on June 21, 2024 to conduct a virtual hearing of Ms. Zhang’s case. The virtual hearing was due to the fact that Ms. Zhang had failed the required physical examination multiple times and that she suffered severe head, arm, and leg injuries after taking a fall days prior to the hearing. Instead of allowing her time to recover, the Dehui City Court decided to go ahead with a virtual hearing at her home.
During the hearing, the court played several video clips that showed the back of a woman. The judge asked Ms. Zhang to confirm it was her and she said that it wasn’t her.
While it is totally legal to distribute Falun Gong informational materials, Ms. Zhang and Ms. Liu did not do so at the said residential area during the said time as alleged by the police. Ms. Zhang condemned the court for continuing to prosecute her following her initial arrest on August 12, 2022 simply for her faith in Falun Gong.
Staffers from the Dehui City Court and Yushu City Police Department showed up at Ms. Zhang’s home on August 19, 2024 to deliver the verdict. It’s not clear whether she has been taken back into custody to serve time.
This is not the first time that Ms. Zhang has been targeted for her faith. She was arrested several times before and given one year of forced labor in 2000.
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