(Minghui.org) Chief Li Xuhe and other officers with the Jinchuan District Domestic Security Division in Jinchang City, Gansu Province, arrested two female Falun Gong practitioners in broad daylight two years ago and confiscated the keys to their homes. They ransacked their homes and stole their personal property.

The police then arrested the practitioners' relatives and friends, ransacked their homes, and extorted “confessions” from them to frame the practitioners. The police claimed that, with the confiscated items, they could easily sentence the practitioners to three or four years of imprisonment. In the end the police collaborated with the local Procuratorate and court to illegally sentence four Falun Gong practitioners to three to five years of imprisonment.

The Chinese regime's formula for persecuting Falun Gong practitioners has become formulaic: arrest, ransack, trump up false charges, and sentence. Below is an account of what happened two years ago.

Practitioners Ms. Li Yinghua and Ms. Yu Chenghong were purchasing kitchen appliances at a store located in the Jinge Shopping Plaza, Jinchang City, around 5 p.m. on November 13, 2011, when two plainclothes officers rushed in and tried to grab their shoulder bags. Ms. Yu asked, “Who are you? How can you rob us in broad daylight?” The taller man claimed he was from the Jinchang City 610 Office. It was revealed later that he was Li Xuhe, chief of Jinchuan District Domestic Security Division.

Because the women held on to their shoulder bags, Li shouted to the store employers to lock the door. The other man took out a bottle and sprayed the practitioners' faces. Immediately an irritating odor permeated the store, making everyone cough and irritating their eyes. Li Xuhe then handcuffed Ms. Li and Ms. Yu. Two other plainclothes officers dragged them into a van parked outside.

Ms. Li and Ms. Yu were taken to the Binhe Road Police Station. The police searched their bags for their husbands' telephone numbers and the keys to their homes. They went to their homes and searched them without a warrant. Li Chunhai, Cai Jianjun, Xu Haifeng, Jia Delan, and Wang Wenming were involved in the ransacking.

From Ms. Li's home they took over a dozen Dafa books, a computer and monitor, a color inkjet printer, MP4 player, MP3 player, Sony CD writer, DVD player, and unopened DVD disks worth 1,000 yuan. The total value of the items was over 10,000 yuan.

From Ms. Yu's home they took over a dozen Dafa books, a laptop computer, printer, MP4 player, MP3 player, Sony CD writer, 20 DVD disks, and 10 VCD disks. The total value of the items was over 20,000 yuan.

Officers from the Binhe Road Police Station, Domestic Security Division, and the 610 Office of Jinchang City took the confiscated items to the Binhe Road Police Station and piled them on the floor inside the office. They interrogated Ms. Li and Ms. Yu overnight but got no information about other practitioners. They shouted, “Even if you two say nothing, we can sentence you to three or four years of imprisonment just based on this pile of items.”

The police took Ms. Li and Ms. Yu to the Baye Hospital for a physical in an attempt to put them into a detention center. Ms. Li had high blood pressure but the police ignored her condition. At 2 a.m. the 610 Office agents got the women admitted to the Jinchang City Detention Center.

Other officers arrested Ms. Yu's husband, Lu Jun, after ransacking their home. They detained Mr. Lu in isolation for three days and four nights to try to extort a confession. The police tried everything – threats, persuasion, lying about what his wife said – to try to force Mr. Lu to report the practitioners he had contact with. The police then forced Mr. Lu to knock on the practitioners' doors so they could break in to arrest them and ransack their homes. Several days later the police took practitioners Mr. Chen Xuzhong and Mrs. Liu Zhiping to a detention center.

On November 23, 2012, the four practitioners were tried in the Jinchuan District Court in Jinchang City. Attorneys from Beijing presented a compelling defense that Mr. Chen Xuzhong was innocent of any illegal activity. Even those who audited the trial predicted that Mr. Chen would soon be released with a verdict of "innocent." The Jinchuan District Court, however, followed orders from the 610 Office to sentence all four practitioners.

Ms. Liu Zhiping, retired from an electricity supply workshop of the Jinchuan Group Company, was sentenced to three years in prison.

Mr. Chen Xuzhong, 41, who worked for the Jinchuan Electricity Supply Bureau, was sentenced to four years in prison. He was arrested at the on-duty room of Jinchuan Electricity Supply Bureau around 6 p.m. on November 15, 2011.

At the trial on November 23, the public prosecutor said, “Someone reported that Mr. Chen bought CDs and a cell phone from Lanzhou City.” The defense attorney said, “Purchasing blank CDs and a cell phone doesn't constitute a crime.” The public prosecutor said, “Someone reported that Mr. Chen called him at such-and-such time on such-and-such day.” Mr. Chen said, “On that day I was on the day shift. You can go to my work place to investigate.”

All the public prosecutor's false accusations were refuted one by one by Mr. Chen and his attorney. His attorney explained that that Mr. Chen didn't violate any law, that practicing Falun Gong is completely legal in China, and that the arrest and detention of Mr. Chen were themselves in violation of the law. The attorney asked the court to immediately release Mr. Chen with a verdict of innocent. But the court stubbornly followed orders from the 610 Office and sentenced Mr. Chen.

Ms. Li Yinghua is an official with the Jinchuan Nickle Salt Factory. She was released on the evening of December 13, 2011. But when she returned to work, she was persecuted by Wang Xia, the factory's Party committee secretary, who organized "helpers" for her. Ms. Li was forced to read the Chinese Communist Party newspaper and magazines every day and submit two reports weekly, as well as to hand copy 3,000 words a day from the official Party newspaper and books. She had to clean a section of public road 6 meters wide and 30 meters long and mop over 20 square meters of stairways.

The workshop Party committee secretary, Chen Shengwei, ordered the clerk to file a report dismissing Ms. Li from her post and assigning her to cleaning duty. The company's Party committee deputy secretary, Deng Shaojun, gave orders that Ms. Li be paid only 300 yuan per month up until that point.

Factory personnel Ma Rui and Chen Shengwei frequently harassed Ms. Li under the pretext of chatting with her. After failing to force Ms. Li to write a guarantee statement to stop practicing Falun Gong, Wang Xia dispatched Ms. Li to the White Smoke Workshop (which handles arsenic) in April 2012, forcing her to mop the brick floor of the workshop (over 100 square meters). In addition, she was not allowed to take any vacation time in 2012.

Mr. Lu Jun and Ms. Yu Chenghong are husband and wife. After they were arrested, Mr. Lu's father died in April 2012 under duress. Mr. Lu's underage daughter had to live with her paternal grandmother, who was in poor health. The police intentionally allowed Mr. Lu to be released on bail for over a year, creating an illusion that he would not be sentenced.

Mr. Lu went to the Jinchang Detention Center to bring his wife some things on the morning of December 6, 2012. That afternoon the police detained him at the detention center. Ms. Yu was sentenced to four years in prison, and Mr. Lu was sentenced to five years in prison.