(Clearwisdom.net) Hunan Women's Prison is located at 528 Xiangtan Road in Changsha City, Hunan Province. Since the Chinese Communist Party started persecuting Falun Dafa practitioners in 1999, the 6^th cell block has illegally held female Falun Dafa practitioners. There, brainwashing sessions use torture and violence to force practitioners to give up their belief in Falun Dafa. Though the transformation rate is high, it is accomplished through bloody and sinister means.

From 2007 to 2009, the prison held around one hundred Falun Gong practitioners. In 2010, the number was around eighty or ninety.

The 1^st team of the 6^th cell block holds practitioners who were already transformed against their will, as well as those who enlightened along an evil path. The 2^nd team holds practitioners who remain steadfast in their belief. Prior to 2007, the 1^st team was on the fifth floor of a U-shaped building. There were ten cells in total. In each cell there were twelve beds (futons), with seven or eight practitioners, and four or five other prisoners whose duty was to monitor the practitioners. The 2^nd team was on the third floor in the same building. In each cell there were two or three practitioners, with five or six other prisoners assigned to watch the whole team. After 2007, the 1^st team moved to a new building closer to the prison's third gate.

The names of those who organized the brainwashing sessions are as follows. The head of the 6^th cell block in the prison: Xiao Ping; Deputy head of the 6^th area Zhou Chan; head of the 1^st team Li Jun; head of the 2^nd team Tang Ying; Educational Instructor Deng Jin; deputy head of the Education Section Xue Fang; Head of the brainwashing center Mao Huiping; Guards Zhou Xiaolan, Li Ling, Liu Qian, Zhang Yuyu, Yuan Lihua.

The practitioners were forced to do labor and daily activities inside their cells. They were not allowed to walk out of the door unless there was a family visitation. The practitioners in the 2^nd team were assigned jobs that involve heavy labor. Prior to 2007, the practitioners in the 1^st team had to attend the brainwashing for half a day, and the other half day they had to do manual labor. After 2007, the practitioners were forced to work all day long. The labor included peeling beans, and making bamboo bed sheets. (Note that bamboo bed sheets are widely used as regular bedding in China, especially during the summer time. The special texture of bamboo makes the sheet feel cooler. It is made of strips of bamboo tied together with thread.) Practitioners were forced to wake up around 6 a.m., and after a quick wash start to work. A typical daily workload was 30 to 40 pounds of beans. When the workload was heavier, everyone was forced to do 50 to 60 pounds, sometimes even 80 pounds in a single day. The bamboo sheets for a sofa required ten pieces every day, small bed sheets were one piece per day, and large bed sheets took two people an entire day. Some elderly practitioners were forced to work until 9 p.m., 10 p.m. or even later. Those who worked on beans had to use knives for extended periods. Their hands often bled from cuts by the knife.

1. Brutal Brainwashing

In the latter half of 2004, the prison initiated a three-month-long brainwashing program. In 2005, the prison adopted the use of torture to force practitioners to give up Falun Dafa. Methods of torture include forced standing or squatting for extremely long periods of time, having their hands cuffed behind their backs, beatings, verbal abuse, having cold water poured on them during the winter, as well as other forms of humiliation and threats.

Standing motionless for a prolonged time (demonstration)

Hands cuffed behind the back (demonstration)

The brainwashing center was first located in the floor above the visitation rooms. In April 2006, it was moved to the floor above the cafeteria. On that floor, one side of the hallway was used for storage, and the other for brainwashing. There were about five rooms, with six to eight beds (futons) in each room. One practitioner was handed over to two or three prisoners, sometimes even up to six prisoners. Under orders from the guards, the inmates would viciously persecute the practitioners. Starting around 2010, the guards decided that they wanted soundproof rooms for the brainwashing, and moved the sessions to a floor above the solitary confinement cells.

Ms. Gao Jiarui from Changde was taken to the brainwashing center in March 2006. By the time she was released, both her legs had become swollen. She was sent to the 1^st team. By July 2006, she had been through a “successful” forced transformation. She was ordered to speak at a meeting and slander Falun Gong. Ms. Gao spoke about how practicing Falun Gong helped her to become a good person, how she clarified the truth to people and validated the Fa. Everyone, especially her persecutors, was shocked by her brave actions. Afterwards, the guards started torturing her, forcing her to do heavy labor, and peel 80 pounds of beans daily. The guards also insulted her. The door and window of her cell were shut and tightly covered by thick cardboard. People in other cells often heard the sounds of someone beating her, cursing at her, and using torture implements. Both of Ms. Gao's arms were covered with cuts and wounds. Several months later, Ms. Gao's eyes became dull and her movement was slow.

Ms. Lu Mengjun from Xiangtan was sentenced to a six-year term. Recently it was said that her arm had been fractured from the torture of “carrying a sword on the back”.

Torture of "carrying a sword on the back" (demonstration)

Below is the account of the persecution three practitioners suffered while being held at the brainwashing center:

Practitioner A: I was taken to the brainwashing center shortly after the Chinese New Year. When I arrived there, my shoes and socks were all wet from the snow and water. My toes were numb from the freezing cold. The guard searched through my luggage, and I just sat down and tried to warm-up my toes with my cold hands. But prisoner Huo Ying started cursing at me, claiming that I was doing Falun Gong exercises. They tortured me as a result. The door and window to the room were tightly shut. I was forced to stand every day for a week. I had high blood pressure and heart disease. After I fainted from the torture, I was allowed to take a nap as long as it was after 9 p.m. But shortly thereafter, they started depriving me of sleep. I became so exhausted that I would faint and fall to the ground. They would just pull me up and force me to stand up, or they would pour cold water all over my body. I still remember that on March 5, a snowy day, they poured so much water on me that I was completely soaked from head to toe. I was not allowed to sleep on my bed for forty days. In my delirium from lack of sleep, I started to see things that weren't there. I saw some people wearing long robes and my husband appeared in front of me. I only had a little awareness of the fact that this was caused by my persecution.

Practitioner B: I refused to recite the prison regulations and was forced to stand for a long time. I was so exhausted that I was unable to stand anymore. I had to sit down. The inmates poured cold water on the ground. They dragged me over and forced me to sit in the cold water. They put a portrait of my Master under me, but I managed to pull it away. Two inmates, Cheng Jiawang and Xia Xinhui, cornered me and beat me up. My face was black and blue, and my head was in pain. When I reported the beating to the guards, the guard replied in an obviously faked tone, “I told them not to beat people.” In the evening, Cheng Jiawang viciously beat me again. Beatings became part of an expected daily routine for me. The window and door of the cell were covered by newspapers. It was so dark inside that I lost track of time. They set up this special environment to make you feel that you could be killed at any time. As long as you refused to yield to their demands that you give up your belief in Falun Dafa, they made you feel like you were living every day in hell. Every day I was subjected to various torture methods: forced standing, beatings, being soaked in cold water. I was beaten so hard that I had migraines, which made sleeping very difficult. I felt like I had endured pain beyond my limits, and that I was going to fall apart. The day that I wrote the three statements against my will, I cried out loudly in agony the whole night. I was so ashamed of myself. I let down my Master and Dafa, my heart felt like it was being stabbed with millions of knives. I was sent back to the 1^st team, and forced to do hard labor. The torture on my physical body was less, but the deep pain in my heart tortured me every minute.

Practitioner C: I wrote a solemn declaration to return to cultivation. Guard Li Jun took me to the brainwashing center and started the process of torturing me, which lasted for over two months. At first, I refused when I was ordered to “study” the slanderous materials. Guard Li forced me to stand day and night, and kept two inmates watching me. Several days into this torture, both my legs had become swollen, but they still forced me to stand. In the freezing winter, my feet were too swollen to put on shoes, so they forced me to stand on my shoes with my bare feet. After many days of standing like this, I found myself unable to walk. I had lost feeling from the waist down. In order to take a step, I had to bend 90 degrees forward so that I could move my feet. Going to the restroom took me such a long time. The inmates sarcastically said that I didn't know how to walk because I had to crawl to the restroom. Those were the darkest days. I often lost track of time, and did not know if it was day time or night time outside. I was muddle-headed and began seeing things. Sometimes I didn't even know where I was. Sometimes I fell asleep while standing. My physical body and mind were in constant pain. Inmate Deng Lihua always chose midnight to yell at me viciously, using all kinds of dirty words. One day when the team leader Mao Huiping came to check the cell, I clarified the truth about Falun Gong to her. This made inmate Deng Lihua and Liu Wenhua extremely mad. On the early morning of the next day, they beat me up. I didn't get any sleep. I sat on my bed and told myself that I needed to get some sleep. Liu grabbed me by my clothes and beat me. The beating lasted for several days afterward. A collaborator in the brainwashing center tried to force me to accept her slanderous theories against Falun Gong, but I refused to listen to her. She started yelling and cursed at me. They tried to handcuff me in a torturous posture -- “wearing a sword on your back”. I used all my strength to resist. They got more helpers from other cells. They held me down on the ground, trying to handcuff me. I managed to get my right hand free. They used all the rope they could find in the cells, and even some plastic bags, to tie me up to the window frame. When I tried to get my hands free, I dislocated one of my hands. But it was miraculously back in position shortly after. They hung me up by one of my arms to the window frame. My feet were barely touching the ground. I was exhausted from all the torture I had experienced both day and night. My physical body suffered in the extreme. I started a hunger strike to protest their torture. Several days later, guard Deng Jin said that if I ate, she would allow me to sleep on the bed, otherwise she would force me to stand. I refused to eat and was forced to stand. I was very fatigued and could not stand and fell to the ground. They dragged me up, and I fell down again. Prior to the Chinese New Year, I was forced to sleep for two nights on the hard ceramic tile floor. They even kicked away the slippers I used underneath my head as a pillow.

Hung up by one arm (demonstration)