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Six Practitioners Sentenced in Shanghai
(Clearwisdom.net) In late March 2007, the Xuhui District Court in
Shanghai illegally sentenced six Falun Dafa practitioners. Ms. Bai
Gendi was sentenced to four and a half years in prison, Mr. Zhou Licheng to six
years, Ms. You Xiuyun received a six and a half year sentence, Ms. Wang Guifang
three and a half years, and Ms. Zhou Qin and Ms. Yuan Xiufang each received two
years, with two years suspended. These six practitioners were arrested by the police during the Shanghai Six
Summit (a summit between China, Russia and Central Asian countries) in late May
2006. Prior to their arrests, they had been followed, monitored and had their
phones tapped by the police for a long time. To gather "evidence" and
fabricate witness testimony, the Xuhui District Police Department, Procuratorate
and Court as well as the Shanghai 610 Office kept postponing the
court trial. The practitioners were imprisoned at the Xuhui District Detention
Center for more than ten months before their first court trial on March 24,
2007. During that time, the Shanghai 610 Office closely guarded information
about the practitioners' detention. Ms. Bai Gendi was severely tortured at the Xuhui District Detention Center.
Another reason that the Shanghai 610 Office postponed the court date was to keep
the practitioners' family members from finding out that the practitioners had
been tortured. In the court session on March 24, 2007, the primary evidence for the charges
against these six practitioners were nearly 500 unmailed letters to Shanghai
government officials asking them not to involve themselves in the persecution
against Falun Gong, and printed copies of the Nine Commentaries on the
Communist Party found at Ms. You Xiuyun's home. Four Dafa practitioners, including Mr. Zhou Licheng, Ms. Bai Gendi and Ms.
You Xiuyun were handcuffed during the court trial. Although they were very thin
due to the persecution in detention, the practitioners defended their innocence
solemnly, telling the court that Dafa practitioners' truth
clarification is a great benevolent deed to save people and that the
charges against them were illegal. The righteous words from the practitioners made the judge dare not sentence
them in court. The trial was quickly closed. A few days later the trial
continued, but the court did not notify any of the family members. It even
prohibited the practitioners' attorneys from informing them. Ten days after the
court trial, these six practitioners received their court sentences in the mail
but many of their families never received the sentencing notice. Among these six practitioners, some had been tortured by the Shanghai 610
Office many times before. For example, Ms. Bai Gendi, 52, was the first
practitioner from Shanghai to be sent to a forced labor camp. In October 1999,
the Shanghai 610 Office illegally sentenced her to two years of forced labor,
using the excuse that she did the Falun Gong exercises outside the Shanghai
Stadium after the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began to persecute Falun Gong.
The real reason was that her righteous thoughts and righteous actions had
greatly influenced and inspired practitioners at the Shanghai Jiaotong
University exercise center. At the Shanghai City Women's Forced Labor Camp, Ms. Bai Gendi was handcuffed
with her arms behind her back, forced to perform excessive labor, and not
allowed to meet with or even write to her family. But she never gave up her
cultivation. She opposed the persecution at every instance. People there
witnessed the solemness of Dafa in her actions. Many people who knew Ms. Bai,
including the guards, respected her very much. She left the forced labor camp
openly and nobly in October, 2001, however three months later, in March 2002,
Bai Gendi was arrested again and her home was ransacked. Then she was illegally
sentenced to three years of forced labor because the Shanghai 610 Office wanted
to make her an example for persecution. In February 2005, Ms. Bai Gendi again openly left the forced labor camp. Four
months later, in June 2005, she was once again arrested and her home was
ransacked. She was imprisoned at Xuhui District Detention Center. A policeman
held the Nine Commentaries CD found at her home and threatened her,
"A single copy of the Nine Commentaries will get you fours years in
prison. We have found so many copies at your home, you could spend your entire
life in prison." Ms. Bai Gendi held a hunger strike and water fast for ten
days to oppose the persecution. Her health was soon in critical condition. A
month later, she was able to leave the detention center. In early 2006, to avoid police interference and harassment, Bai Gendi left
home and went into hiding. However, the Shanghai 610 Office did not let up on
their persecution of her. After she was arrested in May 2006, they wanted to use
the 500 letters as evidence that she was "coercing" others to write
these letters. Ms. You Xiuyun, 58, lives at Apt. 104, Building 89, the Third sub-division on
Longshui South Road. Ms. You Xiuyun had colon cancer before she started
practicing Falun Gong. After she began the practice, her colon cancer quickly
disappeared. Her relatives and friends witnessed the miracle and wonderfulness
of Dafa. After the CCP's persecution of Falun Gong began in 1999, Ms. You Xiuyun
remained firm in Dafa. She was sentenced to forced labor in 2002. Before she was
taken to the forced labor camp, the Shanghai 610 Office told her that because of
her cancer history, she could go home immediately if she wrote a statement
promising to no longer practice Falun Gong. Ms. You Xiuyun did not comply with
them. While she was at the forced labor camp, her husband could not bear the
pressure any longer, and had a stroke and passed away. The forced labor camp
guards asked her daughter to write a letter to Ms. You saying that if she did
not give up cultivation, her daughter would not acknowledge her as her mother.
Actually, the forced labor camp used this method to break some practitioners.
The guards would repeatedly read the letter in public to make the practitioner
feel that their relatives no longer cared about them. Ms. You Xiuyun's daughter
rejected this request. After that, the forced labor camp never answered her
phone calls about her mother. Information about other sentenced practitioners: Mr. Zhou Licheng, around 65, lives at building 15, Third Sub-division of the
Yuannan region. Phone Numbers (Country code 86 for China, area code 21 for Shanghai) April 18, 2007
Posting date: 4/24/2007
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