The police department in Yushu City illegally arrested Falun Gong practitioners and extorted confessions from practitioners through torture. Because practitioner Zhang Liyou went to appeal, several policemen unlawfully extorted confessions from him. They handcuffed his arms behind his back; lifted him off the ground then threw him down. The policemen muffled his head with a plastic bag to suffocate him and scorched four to five deep holes on his back with cigarette butts. The holes were so deep that we were able to see all the way through to the bones. They tortured him for an entire day, from morning to evening. After he lost consciousness, they woke him up by pouring cold water on him and then resumed the torturing. The evil policemen extorted confessions by cruelly torturing the practitioners Xu Yaxuan, Zhou Yufei and Su Yucai. The policemen viciously stepped on the practitioners' hands and ground down with their feet. Using plastic tubes, they severely beat the practitioners. Xu Yaxuan was beaten into unconsciousness and incontinence of feces. After being tortured for more than ten hours, her daughter was beaten too. The police not only illegally arrested and detained the practitioners, sending the practitioners to labor camps, but also arbitrarily imposed fines on the practitioners from one thousand Yuan (about US$125, two months' salary for a white-collar worker) to several thousand Yuan RMB. Due to this, many practitioners are now in heavy debt. If the practitioners cannot afford the fine, they are kept for extended detention or sent to labor camps. The malicious policemen extorted the practitioners who were repatriated from Changchun with very high transport charges. Many of them were forced to hand out several hundred Yuan each time.
In the detention center, practitioner Wang Baogong, Zhu Wei, Tan Qiucheng, Lu Shulin, and Wu Xiaoguang were badly battered for their peaceful appeal. The warders dragged the female practitioner Zhu Wei for dozens of meters away by her hair; much of her hair was pulled out. She was also badly beaten. For doing the practice, practitioner Zhao Shuxiao, Yang Fuzhen, Wang Weiqing, Shen Hongyan were beaten up by the jailer Hu Haijun, Sun Jingfu and others. The practitioners' faces were beaten black and blue. A woman from Xinli Village who is about six months pregnant was also beaten. Her body was covered with bruises.
Practitioners Liu Shuchun, Liu Shujuan, Zhao Shuxiao and Zhu Jinghua were locked with heavy fetters. The jailers even locked their handcuffs and fetters together so that they were bent over with their heads hanging down. They then forced the practitioners to run and walk in circles. The practitioners would be badly beaten if they did not walk fast enough.
In February 2000, more than a hundred Dafa practitioners were detained in a detention center. They were cursed and beaten by the chief and wardens for practicing the exercises. In the early morning around 5 o'clock, the practitioners suffered freezing in the bitter cold of lower than -20 degree Celsius (equivalent to -4 Fahrenheit) for two to three hours. Practitioner Liu Jinfeng was dragged outdoors by jail officer Gao Yong. She was forced to sit in the snow with two hands stretched out in the freezing cold. The jailer would beat her with a bamboo stick if she made a slight move. Liu's fingers were frostbitten.