(Minghui.org) Mr. Zhang Yi’s wife received a phone call from Shayang Prison in Hubei Province on January 22, 2018, and learned that her husband had been sentenced to 8 years for his faith.

The couple was home on February 7, 2017, when five agents broke in and handcuffed them. The police proceeded to ransack their home before taking Mr. Zhang to Xiaowan Detention Center.

This is not the first time that Mr. Zhang has been targeted for refusing to renounce Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline being persecuted by the Chinese communist regime. He was first arrested in 2003 and detained for one month. He was given one year of forced labor in 2006. The police tried, unsuccessfully, to arrest him again on May 11, 2012.

Mr. Zhang’s wife wasn’t given any notice of his trial following his latest arrest. She and her son visited the prison on February 5, 2018, but were only given five minutes to meet with Mr. Zhang.