(Minghui.org) Ms. Lü Yongzhen was scheduled for release on February 27, 2017, after serving 9 years for distributing information about Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline being persecuted by the Chinese communist regime.
Her family traveled hundreds of miles to pick her up, only to learn that she had been seized by the 610 Office, an extra-legal agency tasked with eradicating Falun Gong and given power to override the judicial system.
According to insiders, the 610 Office had notified the prison authorities of their intention to take Ms. Lü captive upon her release. A car carrying 610 Office agents drove straight into the prison compound that day and took Ms. Lü away. Her family didn’t even have a chance to see her.
Ms. Lü, a 62-year-old Liaoyuan City resident, was arrested on February 27, 2008 and later sentenced to 9 years in prison.
While held at a local detention center, she was subjected to various forms of abuse. She was once stripped down to her undergarments and forced to stand barefoot in the snow for three hours. She was also shocked with two electric batons for over an hour. She went on an 11-day hunger strike in protest, only to be force-fed highly concentrated salt water.
On the day of her prison transfer, she was brutalized again for refusing to have her picture taken. Two inmates slammed her to the ground and stomped on her head. The detention center director slapped her in the face.
The abuse escalated at Jilin Province Women’s Prison, where the guards used various means to try to force her to give up her belief. She was once forced to kneel on a wooden plank for long periods of time. Another time she was made to stand on one leg for hours on end. She soon developed heart problems and suffered from shortness of breath.
She still refused to renounce her faith. The guards then suspended her in the air by tying her four limbs to the frames of two beds. She passed out due to the excruciating pain. They let her down and doused her with cold water. As soon as she came to, she was up in the air again. In order to not leave marks on her limbs, they wrapped toilet paper on her arms and legs.
The guards also made her suffer by alternating between depriving her of food and forcing her to eat excessive amounts of food. She had trouble eating after days without food, but the guards forced her to swallow the food until her face turned blue. They then put a leash on her wrist and walked her like a dog.
The main perpetrators included guards Wu Zelan, Cao Hong, Ni Xiaohong, Zhang Shuling, and Sun Jisheng. They also instigated inmates to torture Ms. Lü, promising them term reductions.
