(Clearwisdom.net) My mother's name is Song Zhezi. She is a retiree of the East District Supply Union in Changde City. She started practicing Dafa in November 1998. Before practicing Dafa, her health was not good, as she suffered from a circulatory disease. She could not drink anything cold, even in the summer. Her legs and feet were often numb and had many varicose veins, making it hard for her to go up and down the stairs. She practiced many kinds of Qigong, tried many folk prescriptions and alternative therapy methods, and underwent examinations at different hospitals. The doctors could not give a definite diagnosis, yet her symptoms were not alleviated. My mother was quite hot-tempered before. Since she has practiced Dafa, she has improved a lot both physically and spiritually. The tremendous change of our mother led my sister and I to begin to cultivate. We could not understand why such a good qigong practice was banned. In April 2000, my mother went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong.

When the Changde City "610 Office" learned that my mother went to Beijing to appeal, they ordered people from my mother's work unit to go to Beijing to look for her and bring her back. My mother came back because she could not find the government appeals office in Beijing. People from Changde City's "610 Office" forcibly took her to the East District Police Station and detained her there for two days. They released her after my family paid the bond and a 4,000-Yuan "penalty" for the travel expenses of people going to Beijing looking for my mother. (The "610 Office" is an agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute powers over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems)

On September 29, 2000, together with more than twenty other local practitioners, my mother went to Beijing again to appeal for Dafa. They were intercepted at Zhengzhou City and detained in the Second Detention Center in Changde City. Because this was her second time of appealing, she was sentenced to one-and-a-half years in a labor camp but was sent back from Zhuzhou City because of her high blood pressure. The Second Detention Center reported her situation to the provincial authorities and received instructions to release her back home. However, the authorities from the "610 Office" sent my mother directly to the city detention center for brainwashing. Additionally, we had to pay the detention center 340 Yuan per month for her living expenses. We, as family members, could only visit her once a month when paying the fee. If this fee was not paid, no family visit was allowed. The next time when we want to visit her, we have to pay more money. More than twenty fellow practitioners were detained at that detention center. They ate the same thing everyday - Chinese cabbage leaves boiled in water. They were beaten or kicked and also mentally abused. They were forced to write the so-called "three statements" - "guarantee" (not to practice Falun Gong) statement, "transformation statement" and "denouncement statement." They were told that they would not be released unless they wrote the "three statements."

There was a special "transformation room" in the detention center. When my mother refused to be "transformed," they instructed more than 20 people to forcibly drag my mother to the transformation room. She was detained alone and her feet were injured. She was mentally abused around the clock and not allowed to sleep. The abuse lasted for more than 20 days, but my mother still refused to give up Falun Gong. Their plans were thus foiled.

On April 2002, my mother and other steadfast practitioners went on a hunger strike together. With righteous thoughts, they got out of the detention center after six days of hunger strike. My mother had been detained for a total of 18 months. Every released practitioner was monitored and followed by police personnel. My mother only stayed at home for eight days before she was arrested again by more than 30 people from the "610 Office," people from the Wuling District Committee, the East District police station, the residential committee and District Supply Union. It happened because someone made three anonymous calls, reporting that my mother was going to Beijing. Later we learned that Li Kaizheng from my mother's work unit's Political and Security Section made it up because my mother went out without reporting to him. When he asked us about my mother's whereabouts, we didn't tell him and also warned him not to help the tyrant to do evil. In addition, he often beat the detained fellow practitioners during my mother's detention.

When my mother was released, she exposed his evil deeds to others. Thus, he waited for revenge. Mother was directly sent to the detention center, where she firmly refused to cooperate with the evil and went on a hunger strike. On the 5th day of the hunger strike, when we went to ask them to release my mother, they shamelessly tried to force us to pay 16,000 Yuan. We refused, so they lowered the amount to 8,000Yuan. We refused again, and it went down to 5,000 Yuan. We still refused. All they wanted was money! Later, after many efforts, my mother was released on her 6th day of her hunger strike.

However, this was not the end of the persecution against my mother. On July 12, 2002, the police arrested my mother in public, four to five of them forcibly lifting my mother into the car. I tried hard to stop them and they hurt my arm. My mother shouted, "Falun Dafa is good" from the car. Later, we heard that she was sent to the "610 Office's" new brainwashing center at the Yuyuan Hotel. I heard that this city wide massive arrest of innocent people was undertaken because on July 11, the mayor of Changde City Chen Junwen publicly announced on television, "We should not be lenient toward Falun Gong practitioners."

About one and a half months ago, my sister left home to avoid being arrested for clarifying the truth to people. On the third day after my mother's arrest I left home too, since I heard that they were also about to arrest me and were prying whether I went on the Internet. I don't want the evil to take me away like they did my mother. They don't abide by any law and don't respect the human rights of Falun Gong practitioners. They are free to arrest people anywhere at anytime. From the day she was arrested until today - July 30, 2002, my mother has been on a hunger strike for 18th days. She still has not been released. Nobody has been allowed to visit her. I hope that people around the world could give us your helping hands, helping us stop the evil persecution against kind, innocent people.

In the meantime, I hope all the Dafa disciples who see this news will send forth righteous thoughts to help our fellow practitioners who are suffering in prison. Please help them to leave the prison with their righteous thoughts and join the magnificent Fa-rectification process as soon as possible. Together we can better clarify the truth and offer salvation to deceived sentient beings.

List of persons who have persecuted Falun Gong in Changde City, Hunan Province:

Mayor of Changde City: Chen Junwen (Office phone number: 0736 7224200 transfer to Mayor office)

Secretary of "610" Office of Changde City: Dai Xi (direct phone number: 0736 610)

Director of Wuling District Political and Security Division of Changde City: Zhu Xueyi (office phone number: 0736 7225594)

Person in charge of brainwashing class in Changde City Detention Center from January 2001 to April 2002: Yang Changwu

Secretary of Wuling District Political and Law Committee of Changde City: Guo Hongmin (office phone number: 0736 7258428)

Staff person: Li Xin