(Minghui.org) A Xinjiang woman was tried for her belief in Falun Dafa in June. The public prosecutor recommended a prison sentence of 30 months or less. The judge will deliver the verdict in three months.
Ms. Zhou Piwen reported a significant improvement in her health and well-being after she started practicing Falun Dafa in 1998. She recovered from all her ailments, and she began to live by the Falun Dafa principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.
After the Chinese Communist Party banned the spiritual practice and started persecuting its practitioners on July 20, 1999, she was frequently harassed, arrested, and detained. She was also put in a brainwashing center and ordered to renounce her faith.
Ms. Zhou filed a lawsuit in 2016 against Jiang Zemin, former leader of the Chinese Communist Party who launched the persecution of Falun Dafa. After she did so, police began to harass and abuse her.
The police confiscated her passport in October 2016 and told her that she would never get it back. Two social workers and three police officers came to her home to ask for information on June 14, 2017. They attempted to take pictures, but Ms. Zhou stopped them. Later, on September 5, 2017, four people, including social workers and police officers, came to her home to ask for information again.
Police arrested her at work on September 24 and ransacked her home. They confiscated many of her personal belongings, including a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a printer, Falun Dafa books, and a picture of Mr. Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Dafa.
Her family was only allowed to visit her once, on October 14.
The Korla Municipal Procuratorate approved her arrest on October 30, 2017. She was tried by the Korla Municipal Court on June 8, 2018. The judge announced that he would deliver the verdict in three months to the detention center where Ms. Zhou is being held and also send a notice to her family via WeChat, a popular social media app in China.
Lawsuit Against Jiang Zemin
Ms. Zhou filed her lawsuit against Jiang Zemin on January 30, 2016. In it, she stated how her health problems were cured after practicing Falun Dafa and how she was frequently persecuted by communist authorities.
Health Benefits
Ms. Zhou had tracheitis when she was young. She caught colds easily and would cough for several weeks each time. She coughed all winter long. To keep from disturbing her class, she spent a lot of energy trying to control her cough, which made her unable to focus on her studies.
Her condition didn't improve when she went to medical school. The teachers and doctors there couldn't come up with a cure. After college, she worked at a drug testing institute. Although she had access to many different drugs, she couldn't find any that helped her.
Her tracheitis developed into asthma in 1995.
She developed hypoglycemia in 1984 and fainted at school one day. From then on, teachers no longer asked her to participate in any intense exercises. The situation improved after she started working, but she developed lumbar muscle strain and cervical spondylosis a few years later.
Ms. Zhou started to practice Falun Dafa in 1998. Shortly afterward, all her ailments were gone, and she has not even caught a cold since then.
Having found spiritual enlightenment and inner peace from practicing Falun Dafa, she tries to be selfless and always considerate of others.
History of Harassment and Torture
After the Communist Party banned Falun Dafa in 1999, she was frequently arrested, harassed, and tortured.
She went to Beijing to appeal for justice for Falun Dafa in November 1999. She was arrested at the Appeals Office and taken back to Korla by local police. They detained her for 24 hours and interrogated her all night long before letting her go.
Her employer moved her to a different position so that she could not interact with other people. She was frequently monitored on her way to and from work.
Her manager badmouthed Falun Dafa in an all-hands meeting in March 2000. When Ms. Zhou went to him to explain the facts about Dafa and the persecution, he reported her to the police. Two officers took her to a police station and detained her for a half day.
Ms. Zhou again went to Beijing to appeal to the central government in May 2000. She was arrested at the Beijing Train Station and for four days. The police officers sent to Beijing to arrest her took a tour of the city when they arrived. They later ordered her employer to reimburse them for the “expenses” they had incurred. Her employer withheld her salary to pay them.
Ms. Zhou was detained in the Korla Municipal Detention Center from June 1 to September 25 and then released on bail. Her employer did not pay her for several months.
At 1 a.m. on July 20, 2001, six police officers broke into her home. They arrested her, ransacked her home, and detained her at Korla Police Department for 24 hours. Three police officers interrogated and threatened her.
The authorities put Ms. Zhou in a brainwashing center for 6 weeks in October 2001. Two “assistants” monitored her around the clock. The police forced her to read books and watch propaganda videos that slandered Falun Dafa. They also pressured her to sign statements promising not to practice Falun Dafa anymore.
Three police officers went to harass her at work on July 21, 2008. They also kept calling her and going to her office, demanding that she go to the police station to be fingerprinted. She refused to go.
Since July 20, 1999, the police have often gone to Ms. Zhou's home, her parent's home, and her parents-in-law's home to ask questions. They've also frequently taken Ms. Zhou to the police station and the police department to record information or to take her fingerprints. They told her to report her status to the guard where she works every evening and to hand in a “thought report” to her employer and the police station every month. They confiscated her ID card in June 2001 to prevent her from traveling.
