(Minghui.org) Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual and meditation discipline with the core principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance and five sets of slow-moving exercises. With its tremendous health benefits, the practice spread quickly throughout China after its public introduction in May 1992. 

It was estimated that between 70 to 100 million Chinese were practicing Falun Gong by 1999. Such enormous popularity and Falun Gong’s revival of traditional culture – that the Chinese communist regime has been working tirelessly to destroy – eventually triggered the nationwide persecution in July 1999.

Within the past 20 years, 4,363 Falun Gong practitioners are confirmed to have died as a direct result of the persecution. These practitioners come from all walks of life, across all age groups. Some practitioners were tortured to death while in police custody, some died after years of torture or from diseases contracted in prisons or labor camps, and others died from the immense fear and mental pressure that was imposed upon them over the course of the persecution.

In this article, we spotlight 15 cases of doctors who were persecuted to death because of their faith.

Case 1: Mr. Liu Haibo Tortured to Death with High Voltage Electric Baton Inserted into His Anus

Mr. Liu Haibo was a radiologist in Changchun City, Jiling Province. He started practicing Falun Gong in 1996.

Mr. Liu Haibo

Mr. Liu was arrested for appealing for Falun Gong in Beijing in 1999 and was later given one year of forced labor. He was tortured and received an additional nine-month term because of not renouncing his faith.

Mr. Li was arrested again on the evening of March 11, 2002. The police brought him and another practitioner, Mr. Zhang Zhongyu to the police station.

During the interrogation, several police officers stripped Mr. Liu of his clothes and inserted the longest electric baton into his anus to shock him, attempting to force him to disclose other practitioners' names and whereabouts. 

They continued torturing him until 1 a.m., when they found that his heart had stopped beating. By the time the emergency vehicle was called in, he had already died. He was 34.

The authorities claimed that Mr. Li died from a heart attack and secretly cremated his body. His son was only three years old at that time.

Case 2: Mr. Li Huiwen Died from Forced-feeding

Mr. Li Huiwen was a doctor in Yangquan City, Shanxi Province. He was arrested sometime in 2002 and given one year of forced labor.

Mr. Li suffered brutal torture at Xindian Labor Camp in Shanxi Province. He went on a hunger strike and was force-fed. Between forced feedings, the guards tortured him by hanging him up by the wrists between two bunk beds.

Mr. Li died from a brutal force-feeding session on February 26, 2003. He was 32.

Case 3: Ms. Dong Cuifang Beaten to Death Eight Days After Being Imprisoned

Ms. Dong Cuifang was a gynecologist in Beijing. She was arrested in 2001 with her fiancé, Mr. Shen Wenjie, a pilot while distributing informational materials about Falun Gong. They were each sentenced to a five-year prison by the Shunyi District Court in 2002.

Ms. Dong was transferred to Daxing Women's Prison in Beijing on March 11, 2003. The inmates forced her to sit cross-legged and tied up her hands and legs. They also deprived her of sleep and didn’t allow her to use the restroom.

She was beaten to death eight days later, on March 19, at the age of 29. Her body was covered with bruises and her legs were swollen and purple. Parts of her legs were pulverized under the knees. On her right shoulder, the bones and muscles had separated.

Ms. Dong Cuifang

Case 4: Mr. Liu Boyang Died of Torture; Body Thrown from Building

Mr. Liu Boyang was a radiologist in Jilin City, Jilin Province. He started to practice Falun Gong in 1995 with his parents.

Mr. Liu Boyang

Mr. Liu was arrested at his workplace on March 16, 2002, as the police attempted to find out his parent’s whereabouts. He was sent to Daguang Detention Center the next day and was held there for 15 days.

The moment after he was released, Mr. Liu was taken back into custody, with his face covered, by officers from the Ministry of State Security. The officers locked him in an isolated room and interrogated him for three days.

Mr. Li was arrested again on June 27, 2002. Officers from the Zhengyang Police Station tortured him with various means, including beating and kicking, slapping his face with leather shoes, covering his head with a plastic bag, and handcuffing his wrists behind his back then hanging him up by his wrists.

Torture Illustration: Hanging up with arms handcuffed behind the back

After a few minutes of the hanging torture, Mr. Liu's arms felt as if they were being torn apart and he sweated profusely. After the torture, his hands were numb and he had difficulty holding anything. It took him a few months to recover.

Four days after the hanging torture, Mr. Liu was sent to Tiebei Detention Center where he was detained for four months.

Mr. Liu was given two years of forced labor and sent to the Chaoyanggou Forced Labor Camp on October 29, 2002.

The guards forced him to sit on the icy-cold cement floor every day, all day, and deprived him of sleep in the winter. They also subjected him to constant brainwashing in attempts to force him to renounce his faith.

The labor camp extended his term for 47 days before releasing him in August 2004.

Mr. Liu and his mother Ms. Wang Shouhui were followed and arrested while delivering informational materials about Falun Gong to another practitioner on October 28, 2005. They were sent to the Kuancheng District Police Department and interrogated there.

Mr. Liu was tortured to death around 8 p.m., at the age of 29. The police threw his body from the building.

A few days later, Mr. Liu’s family was informed about his death and the police claimed that he “committed a suicide” and jumped to his death.

An autopsy was conducted under the family’s request. It showed that his head had three holes made by a blunt instrument, his legs and ribs had fractures and blood was found in his lung. According to medical analysis, the three holes in his head were the cause of his death.

After Mr. Liu was killed, his mother was sent to the No. 3 Detention Center in Changcun City. She was also persecuted to death on November 11, 2005.

Case 5: Mr. Wang Jiping Died from Illnesses Contracted during Detention

Mr. Wang Jiping was an anesthetist in a military hospital in Harbin, Heilongjiang Province. He began practicing Falun Gong in September 1996.

Mr. Wang Jiping

Because of his faith, the hospital where he worked detained Mr. Wang in a warehouse for a month in July 2001 and forced him out of his job in 2003. His professional certification was also suspended.

Mr. Wang and his wife Ms. Zhao Wenlin were arrested while passing out information about Falun Gong on September 29, 2004. The police ransacked their home.

While Ms. Zhao was detained at Baoquanling Detention Center, Mr. Wang was picked up by the officials from his hospital and then kept in an office there.

Mr. Wang went on a hunger strike to protest the arbitrary detention. Liu Yingshan, the head of the hospital, ordered five soldiers to forcibly inject him with a sleeping drug. They also put him under anesthesia and administered an unknown drug intravenously.

Liu pressed hard on his throat and almost suffocated him.

Once during a forced-feeding session, the head of local 610 Office came in to interrogate Mr. Wang. They ordered Mr. Wang to stand, even though he was very weak. The officers slapped him in the face and shoved him.

Mr. Wang Jiping escaped the hospital on the morning of October 9, 2004, only to be arrested again on October 22.

He was later given three years of forced labor and held in a detention center within the Shenyang Military Region.

Groups of people came to pressure Mr. Wang to give up Falun Gong and write “thought reports” to slander Falun Dafa and Dafa's founder. He was constantly starved and developed high blood pressure, kidney failure, and uremia.

Mr. Wang was released early in December 2006 before his term ended. He was very weak and almost completely blind. He was forced to retire from the military and his assigned apartment was taken back.

His wife divorced him under the intense pressure. His parents and siblings also kept a distance from him, due to the Communist party's policy of implication. Mr. Wang was homeless and had to move from place to place.

Under severe mental, physical, and financial stress, he died alone at the age of 39 on February 4, 2009.

Case 6: “The Lung Was Like Worn-out Cotton Wadding”

Ms. Shen Yueping was a gynecologist in Yuxi City, Yunnan Province. She started to practice Falun Gong in 1996.

Ms. Shen Yueping

Ms. Shen, her husband, and their son went to Beijing after the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) started to persecute Falun Gong. They held a banner printed with “Falun Dafa is good!” on Tiananmen Square on October 1, 2000. They were arrested and taken back to Yuxi City. Ms. Shen was given three years of forced labor and detained at Dabanqiao Women's Forced Labor Camp in Kunming City. She was released in 2003.

Ms. Shen and her husband were arrested by police from Hongta District, Yuxi City in December 2004, because of talking to people about Falun Gong at a trade show. She was sentenced to five years in prison and detained at the No. 2 Women’s Prison of Yunan Province.

She was kept in solitary confinement for three years. Every day, she was forced to sit on a hard board for at least 15 hours and not allowed to stand up or walk around, or she would be beaten and verbally abused. The inmates would pinch her and stab her with needles.

The guards only allowed her to take a shower once every two weeks and didn’t provide her with sanitary napkins during her menstrual period.

She was frequently forced to take unknown drugs even though she was not ill. After she took the drug, she coughed uncontrollably, day and night. If she refused to take the drugs, the guards would put them in her food. The coughing continued for eight months.

Ms. Shen fell unconscious on May 11, 2009, and was sent to the hospital. The doctor issued two critical condition notices for her that day. But instead of providing her with continued medical care, the authorities transferred her to a hospital with very poor facilities two days later in order to save costs.

Under her family's strong request, Ms. Shen was released on medical parole on May 15. She too weak to talk by then and was sent to a larger hospital and was put on a ventilator 24 hours a day.

Ms. Shen Yueping in the emergency room

The doctor told her family that her lung had developed holes “like worn-out cotton wadding,” and it was too late to treat her.

Ms. Shen passed away at 11:30 p.m. on July 16, 2009. She was 49.

Case 7: Ms. Gong Hui Died After Being Force-fed with Toxic Drugs

Ms. Gong Hui was a doctor in Tianjin and retired early due to sickness. She started practicing Falun Gong in 1997 and was illness-free several months later.

Ms. Gong Hui

Ms. Gong was arrested on August 13, 2008, and detained at the Nankai District Police Department for one month and four days. She was then subjected to forced labor and was sent to Banqiao Women’s Forced Labor Camp in Tianjing City on September 17, 2008. 

Ms. Gong shared a cell with two drug addicts in the No. 1 Ward of the forced labor camp. She was forced to stand for long periods of time because she refused to recite the labor camp rules.

It was suspected that drugs were put in her food and water, which left her mentally unbalanced, with a blank stare and tremors. She was also unable to sleep normally and walked around in her cell with a generalized tremor. While in this condition, she gave the statements to give up her faith.

Even though the diagnosis of her symptoms was inconclusive, she was forced to take a large amount of neurotoxic and nerve-suppressing medications, and she passed each day in agony and confusion.

A shiny, fibrous-looking substance was seen in the drinking water that was provided to some Falun Gong practitioners. After drinking this water, the victim's tongue would feel numb and bleed a little. The tongue would also feel like it was wrapped with metal wire. After a while, the victim would feel numbness all over, her whole body would shake, and she would experience confusion and shortness of breath, resulting in difficulty controlling herself and keeping calm.

Ms. Gong was sent home on December 4, 2009, ten months after she became mentally unstable. She passed away 22 days later. She was 57.

Case 8: Chinese Medicine Doctor Du Juan Died of Late-Stage Cancer in Prison

Ms. Du Juan was a Chinese medicine doctor in Beijing. After the CCP started to persecute Falun Gong in July 1999, she was given one forced labor term and two prison sentences. She was subjected to various forms of torture during her detention.

Ms. Du Juan

While serving a three-year term at Beijing Women’s Prison between 2005 and 2008, Ms. Du was placed under strict control for one year. She was not allowed to sleep and was forced to stand for long hours or sit still for long hours. Her legs and thighs were swollen due to the abuse.

Torture Illustration: Sitting on a Small Stool for Long Hours

The guard Liu Yingcun instigated inmate Zhang Ping to beat her. Her tail bone oozed a watery pus as a result of kicks from the inmates, and her whole body was covered with bruises. Yet she was still forced to do hard labor.

On May 6, 2010, Ms. Du was arrested again and sent to the Chaoyang Detention Center. Later, she was sentenced to three years in prison and sent to Beijing Women’s Prison again. 

Mr. Du developed breast cancer while enduring severe abuse in prison. It quickly advanced into late-stage cancer. Her family requested medical parole for her many times, but the prison authorities refused to release her.

Ms. Du passed away on June 14, 2011, at the age of 57. She was survived by an intellectually disabled son and her 90-year-old father who was a retired military doctor.

Case 9: Ms. Jiang Cuiping Died After Years of Harassment 

Ms. Jiang Cuiping was a retired doctor from the Hefei University of Technology. She began practicing Falun Gong in 1993.

Ms. Jiang Cuiping

Ms. Jiang was first arrested on December 5, 1999, for appealing for Falun Gong in Beijing. She was detained in a brainwashing center for 10 days.

She was arrested two more times, on September 28, 2007, and May 21, 2008.

Ms. Jiang was arrested a fourth time on July 23, 2012, for talking to people about Falun Gong at a local fresh market. She was released the same day.

Over the next few months, the police and staff members from Hefei University of Technology frequently came to her home to harass her.

Ms. Jiang became depressed, frightened, and worried day and night. Her health declined and she was found to have lung cancer in October 2012.

On November 22, 2012, more than ten police officers broke into her house, forcefully carried her downstairs and pushed her into a police car. She was directly sent to the brainwashing center operated by the Hefei City 610 Office.

Under the devastating pressure from the persecution, Ms. Jiang died on February 2, 2013. She was 74.

Case 10: Mr. Xie Shiliang Passed Away After Nine Years in Prison 

Mr. Xie Shiliang was a doctor in Changzhou City, Jiangsu Province. He took up Falun Gong in March 1996.

Mr. Xie was well known for his medical skills and integrity among the residents in his village and the surrounding area. Once, an elderly farmer paid his bill with a counterfeit 50-Yuan note that he did not know was counterfeit. Mr. Xie realized that it was hard for the elderly man to earn enough money to get by, so he accepted the bill without saying a word and tore up the counterfeit bill after the man left.

Mr. Xie Shiliang

Because of persisting in his faith in Falun Gong, Mr. Xie suffered arrests, home ransackings, beatings, detention, and brainwashing.

Mr. Xie was first arrested on May 12, 2001. The police kicked him and pushed him to the ground when he asked to see their police ID. Officer Liu Zekun held Mr. Xie down with his knees and choked him.

Mr. Xie was then taken to the police station and held in a detention center for 15 days. He was not allowed to sleep and was forced to stand and face a wall for long hours.

Mr. Xie was arrested again at his home on April 2, 2002. He was sent to a brainwashing center for several days and then to Wujin Detention Center. 

He was arrested for the third time on May 27, 2002, and sent to a detention center later. He was secretly sentenced to 10 years in prison on November 29, 2002, and taken to Suzhou Prison. 

In Suzhou Prison, Mr. Xie was forced to do manual labor and his hands were injured. Because of refusing to be brainwashed, he was held in solitary confinement for a long time.

In 2006, driven by the enticement of term reductions, inmates brutally beat Mr. Xie. His chest ached for several months and he lost all of his teeth. Because of the continuous torture, he spit up blood from internal bleeding and was sent to the emergency room.

The prison officials repeatedly denied his family's request for medical parole. Mr. Xie was finally released at the end of 2010 because they feared that he might die in prison. He was skin and bones by that time.

Upon Mr. Xie's release, judicial officials frequently broke into his home and harassed him. He passed away on June 23, 2012. He was 68.

Case 11: Mr. Zhao Bin Beaten to Death in Shanghai Prison

Mr. Zhao Bin was a doctor in Weifang Prison Hospital of Shandong Province. During his work at the hospital, he treated the prison guards and detainees with kindness and won people's respect. He published articles in magazines and journals and won several awards. However, in his prime of life, he developed cancer. In desperation, he began to practice Falun Gong and soon recovered.

Mr. Zhao Bin

Mr. Zhao Bin went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong in July 1999. He was arrested, subjected to brainwashing, and fired from his job. He had to work as a loader at a shipping company to maintain a living. Later he worked for a company in Shanghai.

Mr. Zhao was arrested at 9 p.m. on April 27, 2012. He was sentenced to four years in prison by the Changning District Court on July 11, 2013.

Forty-seven days after he was sent to Tilanqiao Prison, he was beaten to death by the inmates on October 19, 2013. His body was cremated quickly on October 24, 2013. He was 58.

Case 12: Ms. Huang Wenqin Died from Abuses in Detention

Ms. Huang Wenqin was the chief pharmacist at Qingan Hospital, Fuyang City in Jiangsu Province. She suffered repeated persecution since the CCP started the persecution of Falun Gong in July 1999.

Ms. Huang was arrested at work on June 3, 2010. She was sent to the Fuyang Detention Center on July 5, 2010, and was given one year of forced labor.

While serving time at Jiangsu Women’s Forced Labor Camp, she was forced to stand under the hot sun in the summer and was not allowed to drink water or use the toilet. Sometimes the standing torture continued until midnight. She became emaciated in less than a month, her weight dropping to only 88 lbs.

Ms. Huang was arrested again on November 8, 2013, only two years after she was released. She was sent to the Changzhou Detention Center the next day, where she was subjected to physical abuse, including being forced to wear shackles, beatings, being dragged on the ground, and having her hair pulled.

Five months later, Ms. Huang showed symptoms of multiple ailments including uremia, high blood pressure, and anemia. She wasn’t given medical treatment until her life was clearly in danger.

Ms. Huang was sentenced to four years by the Fuyang Court on April 4, 2014. 

She passed away six months later, on October 22. She was 46.

Case 13: Senior Chinese Medicine Doctor Died in Prison

Mr. Wang Jigui was a Chinese medicine doctor in Yangquan City, Shanxi Province. He started to practice Falun Gong in 1997. He worked diligently and helped those in need. He refused to accept any gifts from the patients. When a patient paid his phone bill out of gratitude, he paid back the money.

Mr. Wang Jigui

Mr. Wang was arrested on July 18, 2012, and detained in the Yangquan Detention Center for 15 days. He was arrested again on August 4, 2014, and sent to the Pingding County Detention Center.

He was sentenced to three years in prison by the Pingding County Court on February 4, 2015, and sent to Jinzhong Prison in Shanxi Province on May 14, 2015.

On June 2, 2016, Mr. Wang’s family was informed that he had died in the hospital. The family wondered what could have caused his sudden death since he'd just called them six days before and he sounded fine at that time.

Mr. Wang’s death certificate listed “sepsis” as the cause of death, but his family was not given any autopsy results. His body was cremated on June 8. He was 59.

Case 14: Ms. Chen Cunmei Died After Years of Persecution

Ms. Chen Chunmei was a chief nurse in Nanjing Children's Hospital in Jiangsu Province. She started to practice Falun Gong in July 1996 and recovered from various illnesses three months later.

Ms. Chen Cunmei was chased by four plainclothes police on September 30, 2000 while she was calling out “Falun Dafa is good!” on Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

Over the course of the persecution, Ms. Chen was given one forced labor term, sent to brainwashing centers six times, and had her home ransacked ten times.

She was held at the Nanjing City Detention Center following her arrest on April 20, 2012, and forced to take unknown drugs. Despite her weakened condition, she was transferred to a brainwashing center 36 days later and held there for another 40 days. She lost one-third of her body weight, from 130 lbs to around 88 lbs.

On November 20 of the same year, she was given one year of forced labor, but was ordered to serve time outside of the labor camp.

Ms. Chen’s health continued to deteriorate upon returning home, due to the mental distress from the persecution and toxicity of the drugs she was forced to take. She passed away on December 24, 2016. She was 62.

Case 15: After More than 30 Arrests and Detention, Ms. Wang Ping Died from the Persecution

Ms. Wang Ping was a doctor at the Wuhe County Health and Epidemic Prevention Station in Anhui Province. She took up Falun Gong in 1998.

Ms. Wang was arrested more than 30 times and detained in detention centers, brainwashing centers, mental hospitals, forced labor camps and prisons.

She suffered torture during the detentions. After she was released from prison on May 5, 2015, Ms. Wang was very weak. She continued to be harassed and was sent to a mental hospital, where she was injected with unknown drugs. Her health deteriorated and she became unable to take care of herself. Ms. Wang died in May 2017, at the age of 53.