(Minghui.org) A married couple in Jiaozhou City, Shandong Province were recently imprisoned to serve six years for their faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual and meditation discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Mr. Du Zhaocai, 50, and Ms. Wu Ruifang, 49, were arrested on August 8, 2018. They were tried by the Huangdao District Court on December 3, 2019, and sentenced to six years each. Both of them appealed the verdicts, but the Qingdao City Intermediate Court ruled to uphold their sentences.
Mr. Du was transferred to Shandong Province Prison on July 5, 2020, from the Jiaozhou City Detention Center.
Ms. Wu, who has been held at Pudong Detention Center in Qingdao City since her arrest, was taken to the Shandong Women’s Prison in Jinan City on July 15, 2020. She refused to cooperate with the physical examination and coronavirus test, and was handcuffed, deprived of food and water, and denied restroom use by the police.
As a result of the abuses, Ms. Wu developed a fever. The officers forced her to take some medicine and let her stay in a room with air conditioning, but her fever still persisted.
The police brought her back to Qingdao, which is over 200 miles from Jinan, around 9 p.m. on July 15. She was held at the Chengyang Detention Center, where she was given very poor quality food and forced to sit on a small stool without moving for long hours every day. A guard watched her over the surveillance camera and would shout at her through a loudspeaker if she talked or turned her head.
Despite the hot and humid weather, the detention center often denied her showers. She was given only one set of short sleeve shirt and pants and was unable to change clothes or do laundry.
After spending more than one month at the Chengyang Detention Center, Ms. Wu was taken back to the Pudong Detention Center on August 22 and then transferred to the Shandong Women’s Prison on September 16.
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