(Clearwisdom.net) Around May 17, 2002, Dafa practitioner Wu Baowang was persecuted to death after 27 days of internment in a detention center in Shuangcheng City.
Wu Baowang was a Dafa practitioner from Qingling town, Shuangcheng City, Heilongjiang province. He began to practice Falun Gong in December 1995 and always viewed the Fa as his teacher. He treated others with kindness and liked helping people. All the villagers said that he was a good man.
In order for more people to learn about and receive the benefits of Falun Dafa, he took a tape recorder and visited many households. Wu Baowang was the first one who stood up to validate Dafa after Jiang's regime began to persecute Falun Gong on July 20, 1999. He went to Beijing to appeal for Dafa on August 1, 1999. Seeing that many fellow practitioners did not step forward, Wu Baowang felt very worried in his heart. After he came back to Shuangcheng from Beijing, Wu Baowang found fellow practitioners and shared his experiences with them, encouraging them to step forward to validate Dafa. Under his guidance, many Falun Gong practitioners went to Beijing to validate Dafa. His whole family went to Beijing to appeal for Dafa three times successively.
The authorities in Shuangcheng City regarded him as a thorn in their side. The Police Department targeted him for persecution. When Wu Baowang went to Beijing to validate Dafa for the third time in 1999, all three people in his family were arrested. He was escorted back to a detention center in Shuangcheng City on September 17 and bound to a steel chair. Then he was forced to wear the handcuffs and shackles reserved for death row prisoners for about 40 days. He was kept with the death row prisoners. The prison guards often directed the prisoners to beat and curse him. There were two large wounds on his head as a result of their beatings. One of his front teeth was knocked out. He could not breathe because his chest was severely injured as a result of the beating and from spasmodically coughing for several months. The prison guards used various cruel torture methods to persecute him, but could not make him renounce his belief. Nine months later, the "6-10" office [an agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute power over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems.] forcefully sentenced him to one year forced labor and sent him to the Yimianpuo quarry where he suffered even crueler persecution.
It was in June and very hot. Falun Gong practitioners had to carry a full basket of rocks while other prisoners only had to carry a half basket. If the practitioners walked slower, more rocks were added to their baskets and they were often beaten and cursed. They were so tired that they could not breathe properly. Their bodies were heavily perspiring and they had to open their mouths to breathe heavily. They were denied water the whole day. Falun Gong practitioners were treated inhumanly, living every day in agony. It was at this time that several collaborators, [former Falun Gong practitioners who have gone astray due to brainwashing and torture] were able to confuse Wu Baowang He lost his focus and signed their documents renouncing his belief. He was released in August 2000.
With Master's hints and help from fellow practitioners, Wu Baowang felt extremely regretful after he came back. In May 2001, he wrote a solemn declaration saying, "I declare that all that I said and wrote that did not conform to Dafa null and void. I am determined to do well again."
At 10 PM April 19, 2002, the police of the village, the town party secretary, and two policemen from the local police station illegally arrested Wu Baowang. His family members were denied their right to visit him in the detention center or to send him things. He was persecuted to death only 27 days after he was detained at the young age of 36.
At the insistence of his family members, the "6-10" office found a medical examiner to do the postmortem examination. People discovered that there were two extravagated blood filled bumps at the back of his head, his stomach was black and full of blood and water and his esophagus and trachea were severely damaged. But the medical examiner noted it as inflamed. His family members were not permitted by the authorities to ask the medical examiner any questions.
On the funeral day, Shuangcheng city deployed a lot of policemen to strictly control the people and their movement at the crematorium and forced Wu Baowang's mother, wife and two elder sisters into a vehicle and then took them to the Police Department. When the family asked for Wu Baowang's ashes, they were charged one thousand Yuan by the police [500 Yuan is the average monthly income for an urban worker in China.]
According to insiders, several Dafa practitioners in cell #6 of the detention center held a hunger strike to protest the illegal detention and to demand being set free with a verdict of not guilty. On May 17, 2002, the supervisor Li Huaixin, together with a group of prisoners, carried Wu Baowang out to force feed him with a solution made of large quantities of salt and little water. Half an hour later, he was back with only a little breath left, being unable to talk. He died the next day.
Wu Baowang's wife, elder brother and sister had all been illegally sentenced to one year of forced labor reform. His mother, more than 70 years of age, was also once illegally detained for three months in the detention center in Shuangcheng city. The family was financially persecuted to the point of being penniless, which made their lives miserable. Now his mother and wife are living a very poor life. There is not even any shelter for them.