Mr. Xie was born in November 1978. He came from Xintang Village, Xinfu Township, Simao District, Yun'nan Province. He started to practice Falun Gong in 1998 while he was studying at the University of Science and Technology of China in Anhui Province. He conducted himself strictly according to Falun Gong's cultivation principles of Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance, and became known as an excellent student at school. After Jiang Zemin's senseless persecution of Falun Gong began on July 20, 1999, Mr. Xie Hongyu went to Beijing three times with fellow practitioners to appeal for Falun Gong. As a result, the "610 Office" at school and the local police persecuted him. The Head of the Anhui Provincial Committee met with him once directly to try to coerce him into giving up his belief in Falun Gong. Because Mr. Xie was determined to maintain his personal belief, the school expelled him and made his father take him back to Yun'nan.

After Mr. Xie returned to his hometown, he was put under surveillance set up by his home province, district, country, township and village "610 Offices," as well as the local police. He also suffered from their repeated threats and harassments. In addition, Mojiang County and Xinfu Township established a special task team to make him renounce Falun Gong. They asked the county government leaders to be responsible for making him renounce Falun Gong. The County Committee, County Government, County's Political and Legal Committee, County Committee's Propaganda Division, County's Public Security Bureau, Xinfu Township's Party Committee, and Xinfu Township Government's leaders repeatedly had "talks" with him, where they took turns pressuring him and threatening him to try to force him to renounce Falun Gong. In May 2000, the State Security Brigade in Mojiang County illegally confiscated Zhuan Falun, Falun Dafa and The Great Consummation Way of Falun Gong, his manual transcription of Zhuan Falun, Falun Gong lecture tapes, and exercise music tapes. In December 2000, Mr. Xie was abducted from home and sent to the forced brainwashing class set up by Yun'nan Province's "610 Office" in Kunming.

Because of the excessive persecution from all levels of the "610 Office" in his hometown and the local police, Mr. Xie suffered immense psychological pressure for a long period of time. After he was released from the forced brainwashing class in Kunming, the "610 Offices" and the local police claimed that Mr. Xie suffered from a psychological disorder because he practiced Falun Gong, and they put him in the hospital. Even while he was detained in the hospital, the "610 Offices" did not reduce their persecution against him. In March 2001, Yun'nan Province's "610 Office" formed a "lecture tour group." When the group traveled to the Simao District, they made a special trip to the hospital and tried to force him to renounce Falun Gong.

After Mr. Xie was released on August 9, 2001, he continued to be subjected to immense pressure from all sides, especially from his own family, who had fallen prey to Jiang Zemin and his henchmen's slanderous lies about Falun Gong. His family strongly objected and obstructed his cultivation practice in Falun Gong. Traumatized by the external and domestic persecution, Mr. Xie became mentally unstable. He was later hit by a speeding car and died on August 23, 2001.