(Minghui.org) An engineer of Tangshan Steel Group was recently indicted for refusing to renounce Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline being persecuted by the Chinese communist regime. It took her lawyer several attempts to be finally allowed to see her and to review her case file.
Ms. Wang Yaxin was arrested on May 7, 2017 and indicted on August 3. She is awaiting trial at Tangshan First Detention Center.
Her lawyer first tried to visit her on June 20, but was turned away. The detention center said that the local police ordered them to bar the lawyer from meeting his client while the case was being investigated.
The lawyer then visited the local procuratorate, and a staff member named Shi Zhenbiao refused to register his complaint against the detention center.
The lawyer tried the detention center a second time on July 12, with no luck. It wasn’t until August 14 that he was finally granted a meeting with Ms. Wang. She affirmed her determination to represent her, as no law in China criminalizes Falun Gong.
Judge Zhang Chunwei refused to allow the lawyer to review Ms. Wang’s case file when the latter stopped by the local court after meeting her. Judge Shao Fushun also said no and dared the lawyer to sue him.
The lawyer complained to a court vice president and was eventually given access to the case file. However, he was barred from making a photocopy of the list of items confiscated from Ms. Wang’s home.
Ms. Wang later asked her lawyer to file complaints against the local police and the local procuratorate for arresting and indicting her without any legal basis.
Ms. Wang is not the only one in her family that has been targeted for their faith in Falun Gong. Her husband, also an engineer of Tangshan Steel Group, was once imprisoned for two years.
