(Minghui.org) A vegetable vendor in Shouguang City remains detained following his arrest several weeks ago.
Mr. Zhao Shiheng was selling vegetables on November 17, 2017, when police came and seized him. Only hours earlier, the same group of agents had arrested his wife, Ms. Sang Fengying, at home.
The couple was targeted because they refused to renounce Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline being persecuted by the Chinese communist regime. Both Mr. Zhao and Ms. Sang had been repeatedly arrested in the past for their faith. Mr. Zhao was twice imprisoned for a total of 11.5 years.
While Ms. Sang was released later that night, Mr. Zhao remains at Shouguang City Detention Center following his latest arrest, which took place just a bit more than one year after his release from prison.
Ms. Sang, her daughter-in-law, and her young grandson went to Shouguang City Police Department in the early morning of December 4, but the receptionist refused to allow them inside upon learning that they were there to try to seek Mr. Zhao’s release.
The police have not returned the more than 200 yuan in cash that they confiscated from Mr. Zhao.
Mr. Zhao was first arrested on August 11, 2000, and taken to the local village government building. Wang Junwen, the local Party secretary, and police ripped Mr. Zhao’s top and had him stand in the sun in the courtyard for several hours. He had blisters on his back afterward. At night, Wang ordered his people to beat Mr. Zhao until he passed out.
Mr. Zhao and Ms. Sang had just finished lunch on September 19, 2003, when more than a dozen agents broke in and ransacked the house. The local village head tried to stop the police, but was threatened with being charged with “interfering with police.”
Mr. Zhao and Ms. Sang were held in separate rooms at the local police department, where both of them were brutally tortured. Ms. Sang had her hands cuffed behind her back and her mouth stuffed with a dirty cloth. Police used several electric batons to shock her in the face simultaneously until the batons ran out of charge. Ms. Sang’s face was swollen and bruised. She couldn’t see well for a long time.
Mr. Zhao went through the same torture in another room. He was sentenced to 4 years in prison in late December 2003. Ms. Sang was also given jail time, though it is unclear how long her sentence was. She ran into her husband at Weibei Prison in March 2004 and learned that he had also been sent there. He told her that several of his teeth had been knocked out during severe beatings and that he had to do more than 10 hours of hard labor each day.
Mr. Zhao was scheduled for release on May 18, 2007, but his sentence was extended by six months because he wrote a statement to affirm his determination to keep practicing Falun Gong.
Mr. Zhao was seized at his vegetable garden on October 23, 2009. The same group of police proceeded to arrest Ms. Sang, her sister, and the sister’s husband.
Mr. Zhao was beaten by the police. He was sentenced to 7 years in prison six months later. His father passed away several months after his arrest, but police refused to allow him to attend the funeral.
Ms. Sang was given one year and three months of forced labor.
While the couple remained detained, their grape crop was left unattended and could not be harvested.
Shouguang Domestic Security Office: +86-536-5298766, +86-536-5298770Head Sun Wenqing: +86-13506465008Vice head Yuan Dong: +86-13905360013