(Minghui.org) Two Shulan City residents were recently released after being tried for refusing to renounce Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline being persecuted by the Chinese communist regime.
Ms. Tai Lijuan, 50, was seized at her daughter’s residence on October 13, 2016. Police ransacked her own home soon afterwards.
Mr. Wang Xiwu, a teacher at Jishu Town No. 13 Middle School, was arrested at work on October 17, 2016.
Ms. Tai and Mr. Wang appeared in court together with four other local Falun Gong practitioners on May 19, 2017. Their lawyers argued that no law in China criminalizes Falun Gong and that their clients should never have been prosecuted for exercising their constitutional right to freedom of belief.
The presiding judge kept interrupting the lawyers. He later acquitted Mr. Wang but still fined him 5,000 yuan. He sentenced Ms. Tai to two years in prison with three years of probation. He also ordered she pay a fine of 5,000 yuan.
Ms. Tai and Mr. Wang returned home on August 9. Ms. Tai revealed to her family that she had a relapse of her heart ailment while in detention but was still forced to do hard labor.
