(Minghui.org) A 74-year-old resident of Jilin City, Jilin Province and mother of a U.S. resident was recently sentenced to five years for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual and meditation discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Ms. Hu Yulan was arrested on May 16, 2020 after being reported for distributing Falun Gong informational materials. The police ransacked her home the next day and then released her on bail due to the coronavirus epidemic. She was ordered to pay a 3,000-yuan bail bond.
On July 14, Ms. Hu was summoned to the Chuanying District Procuratorate. The prosecutor also called the police to take her for a physical exam. Around 8 p.m. that evening, Ms. Hu was taken to the Jilin Detention Center. The Changyi District Procuratorate approved her arrest before moving her case to the Chuanying District Procuratorate, which then indicted her and forwarded her case to the Chuanying District Court.
Only recently did her family learn she had been secretly sentenced to five years on September 10 and taken to the Changchun Women’s Prison on November 2.
Also in September, the police demanded that her family pay a 5,000-yuan fine for her, which they claimed was the balance of her 10,000-yuan fine back in 2018 for distributing Falun Gong materials.
Prior to her latest prison sentence, Ms. Hu was given one year of forced labor in 2001. She was later arrested on May 20, 2008 for distributing Falun Gong materials and sentenced to three years with four years’ probation by the Chuanying District Court.
Ms. Hu's daughter, Ms. Gao Hongmei, who currently resides in the U.S., is calling on the Chinese authorities to release her mother.