(Clearwisdom.net)

In 2003, Huludao Forced Labor Camp police officers beat to death a forced labor camp prisoner named Zhang Bin. Some of the parties were held accountable and subsequently sued in court. Later the same year, the former director of Huludao Forced Labor Camp and deputy director of Huludao Judiciary Bureau, Wang Chunyuan, and deputy director of Huludao Forced Labor Camp, Yao Chuang (in charge of persecuting Falun Gong practitioners), were dismissed from their posts. The Chinese media exposed this "Zhang Bin incident," shocking the entire nation.

Several Falun Gong Practitioners were tortured to death in Huludao Forced Labor Camp, Huludao City

Media exposure of the incident, in which Huludao Forced Labor Camp (1) police beat a regular forced labor prisoner to death, resulted in the dismissal of some of the responsible personnel, but the violent beating and torturing to death of Falun Gong practitioners have earned awards for their perpetrators. According to known data, at least four hundred Falun Gong practitioners have endured inhumane torture at this labor camp within the last few years, and at least two Falun Gong practitioners, Wu Guoliang and Chen Dewen, were tortured to death. Nevertheless, government officials have gone to great lengths to hide the following facts: The labor camp holds a secret court to rationalize the torture of Falun Gong practitioners. Anti-riot police are called in to brutally abuse practitioners. Sadistically deviant guards regularly dispense many forms of police brutality, including taking unabashed pleasure in the assault of practitioners' genitals with electric batons (2).

The most notorious thug in the labor camp for torturing Falun Gong practitioners is platoon leader Liu Guohua (3), who was never penalized for the crimes he has committed. On the contrary, he was recognized as a "model worker of the province."

In May 2004, five Falun Gong practitioners, Yao Yanhui, Zhang Jihong, You Yuehong, Huang Lizhong and Hu Baochun held a hunger strike to protest the police brutality. Some of them had been on a hunger strike for longer than one hundred consecutive days. Among them, Yao Yanhui and Huang Lizhong have endured many episodes where their lives were in dire danger .

On January 6, 7 and 8, 2003, in order to forcibly brainwash Falun Gong practitioners, Huludao Forced Labor Camp implemented a torture plan that lasted three days and three nights.

Beginning on January 6, all steadfast Falun Gong practitioners were taken to a special torture room, where the prison police stripped the practitioners down to their underwear and then tightly sealed their mouths with wide strips of cloth. Torture methods included: punching and kicking; shocking with electric batons; hanging practitioners up off the ground (4); whipping with plastic tubes and phone lines (three rounds); striking with barbed sticks; "tiger bench," and more. In one particular instance, they used more than ten electric batons to simultaneously shock a practitioner. Every part of the body was shocked and ravaged, including the genital area, burning practitioners' skin and muscle tissue. The whole torture room was filled with the stench of burning flesh. In addition, Falun Gong practitioners were also force-fed unidentified, flake-shaped pills.

Liu Wangli's entire face was severely burned and covered with huge blisters.

Wang Zhongtao endured electric shocks from six electric batons at once. His genital area had also been shocked and was swollen, and his right ear was split open.

Liang Guoman endured electric shocks from seven or eight electric batons simultaneously. His neck and face were badly disfigured from the burning and injuries.

Pei Zhonghua was brutally tortured twice. He endured being shocked by a dozen electric batons at once, and on each of two separate occasions, was force-fed seven unidentified pills.

Deng Wenxing endured electric shocks from four or five electric batons at the same time. During a span of two days, he was tortured for twenty-six hours, during which time he suffered from various forms of torture. His neck and face were badly burned with blisters, and swelled up from the abuse.

Zhang Ligou was so brutally tortured that his heartbeat became irregular. His blood pressure rose to 180/250.

Wang Haiqing endured electric shock from eight electric batons simultaneously to the head, under the arms, on the back and soles of the feet.

Practitioner Li Guanghai is a graduate student in his thirties who was working at the Zinc Plant in Huludao City. He was tortured to the brink of death before being sent to a hospital for emergency treatment. According to the hospital, Li's condition was extremely critical. Both his arms were black and blue from bruising, and he could not eat anything because of the wounds due to torture. However, he was only hospitalized for ten days or so before officials from the forced labor camp came to retrieve him.

Electric batons are the most frequently used torture instruments. In order to force practitioners to give up their belief, and driven by their deviant mentality, some policemen found amusement in torturing detainees or watching detainees being tortured and suffering. Sometimes they used six to seven electric batons simultaneously on one practitioner. After they were done shocking the front side of a practitioner's body, they turned the body over and shocked the back of the body. Even women in their sixties and one eighteen-year-old unmarried girl were not spared.

An electric baton burns a blister or a black spot on the human body even when it just slightly touches the skin. Under the influence of an electric current, human muscles twitch and limbs jerk uncontrollably. Even after the electric current stops, the muscles still keep cramping for a long time. The entire room where the torture is dispensed and adjoining corridor fill with the stench of burning flesh. For one who has never been shocked by an electric baton, the pain is unimaginable.

Sadistic policemen employed various instruments of torture especially to sensitive parts of the body such as the arch of the foot, the armpit, and even to a male practitioner's penis and anus or to a female practitioner's vagina. This was a frequently used torture at Huludao Forced Labor Camp.

In June 2000, Mr. Zhao Lianxin, a Falun Gong practitioner in his thirties and a business owner in Gangtun Town, Lianshan District, Huludao City, was thrown into a strictly controlled chamber because he persisted in practicing Falun Gong. Liu Guohua led Wang Shengli, Zhang Fusheng and ten other policemen in forcing Mr. Zhao and other steadfast Falun Dafa practitioners to watch anti-Dafa propaganda videos. The practitioners resolutely refused to watch, so the police conducted inhumane torture on each of them, one by one.

Mr. Zhao was the first to be dragged out of the chamber. Four or five policemen stood on him to keep him from moving, then began slapping his face with the hard sole of a leather boot. Liu Guohua and other policemen then used electric batons to shock Mr. Zhao on his back. After a while, Mr. Zhao's shirt was soaked in blood. The police removed his pants and shocked his genitals with the electric batons. Then they forced the electric baton into his rectum. He was tortured to the point of teetering between life and death. The police poured water over him and continued to shock him. His head was covered in bruises and his eye sockets were swollen to the point that not even a thin slit could be seen. He became so horribly disfigured that even people who knew him well could not recognize him.

Six Falun Gong practitioners, including Mr. Zhao, were all tortured to an extreme degree. After the torture, they were handcuffed together and had to sleep on the cement floor. The next day, led by Liu Guohua, several policemen punched and kicked the practitioners one by one. They grabbed their hair and slammed their heads against the ground. Then they shocked the practitioners again with electric batons. This torture lasted for four days.

On November 29, 2001, twenty-five practitioners detained on the first floor of the forced labor camp went on a hunger strike to demand their unconditional release. That morning, Liu Guowen read aloud a fabricated article, claiming it was from Teacher Li. Practitioner Tian Zhanliang emphatically denied it. That same afternoon, Team Leader Liu Jiawen called Tian Zhanling out and beat him with electric batons for several hours. Tian could not move for a long time, and his ribs were broken. His injuries were so serious that he had to ask someone to hold his ribs whenever he needed to cough. Another practitioner, Cong Guozhi, was also taken out for a "talk." Worried that Cong Guozhi would also be beaten, the other practitioners strongly demanded that they release Mr. Cong.

The labor camp reported this to the City Committee. The president of the Political and Judiciary Committee, Zhou Fenming, personally took charge of the police officers who, the following night, abducted eight practitioners from their beds from the west side of the Hao Building. Most of the practitioners were not wearing shoes or a coat. Three practitioners from the east side of the Hao Building were also taken away by force.

The director of the labor camp took charge, and in the presence of all of the policemen, they used thirty high-voltage electric batons to torture a group of Falun Gong practitioners.

Practitioner Li Guanghai was shocked so severely that his face was beyond recognition. He could not eat solid food, only liquids through a straw. He was unable to stand but had to lie on a bed for over twenty days. Practitioner Wang Hongting was beaten with a leather belt for over forty minutes. The room was full of the smell of burnt flesh from the electric batons when he was carried out of the door. The unbearable stench filled the corridor as well. He was force-fed the next day, and one of his teeth was broken off and pulled out by the root. Practitioner Wang Yueqi, over 50 years old, was stripped naked, and because his back had been severely injured, he had to sleep face down. Practitioner Qian Peng was beaten three times with electric batons and shocked twice when water was splashed on his body.

During this round of persecution, all of the local policemen made an appearance. The known names of the ones who tortured the practitioners are: Liu Guohua; Wang Shengli, Zhang Fusheng, Song and Guo from the Discipline Department; Li Jian and Song Dadui from the 1^st Platoon; Yang, the head of 2^nd Platoon in the General Education Department, Wang Zhuzhen and Zhang Guozhu; Yang, the head of the Grocery Department, and Cui Xiaodong. There were over twenty policemen involved.

Liu Guohua, a platoon leader who is specifically in charge of torturing Falun Gong practitioners at Huludao Forced Labor Camp, is responsible for the death of two Falun Gong practitioners as a result of the cruel tortures. Nevertheless, he was evaluated as the "model of the province" and has been praised and awarded for his work many times.

Mr. Wu Guoliang was a teacher at Gangtun Town Junior High School in Huludao City. In 1998, flooding occurred in Southern China and caused a lot of losses for government and local residents alike. Mr. Wu and his wife Du Li donated 5,000 yuan (5) to the people in the disaster zone.

On October 31, 1999, Wu Guoliang was sent to Huludao Forced Labor Camp for refusing to renounce Falun Gong. He was extremely weak after being abused by many different forms of torture. His health was in critical condition by the time the labor camp finally sent him to a hospital in December. The hospital examination showed an untreatable case of advanced tuberculosis. To avoid taking responsibility, the labor camp released Mr. Wu on medical parole. Wu Guoliang died only ten days after his family members took him home. He was thirty-five years old. His wife Du Li was detained in Masanjia Forced Labor Camp, and her current condition is unknown.

Mr. Chen Dewen was from Chen Village, in Gejia Township, Suizhong County, Liaoning Province. On March 1, 2001, Liu Guohua, the platoon leader who is specifically responsible for torturing Falun Gong practitioners in Huludao Forced Labor Camp, policeman Wang Shengli, staff members Zhang and Guo, and others tied the hands and feet of four Falun Gong practitioners, including Chen Dewen, to the bed and force-fed them with salt water. The prison doctor, Wang Dashu, had added one kilogram of salt to the water. Ten days later, Chen Dewen was carried to a hospital. Afterwards, the prison doctor lied, claiming that Chen Dewen had died from cardiac arrest.

Chen Dewen was tortured to death in Huludao Forced Labor Camp

Hu Baochun, age 48, is a resident of the Yangjiazhangzi Economic Development District in Huludao City. On December 6, 2001, his wife Liu Li was sentenced to a four-year term for persisting in practicing Falun Gong and clarifying the truth about Falun Gong. She was sent to the Liaoning Province Women's Prison, where she died on July 23, 2003. Against her family's wishes, the prison officials cremated her body. Hu Baochun never got to see his wife's body. According to inside information, the prison policemen had beaten Liu Li to death.

Hu Baochun has served three different terms in forced labor camps and is still currently detained at Huludao Forced Labor Camp, where he is cruelly tortured. He became very weak after holding a hunger strike in a detention center. Prison policemen Wei Guozhong and Liu Junke together with the prison doctor, Chen, repeatedly slapped his face, put him on a "Tiger Bench" and tied his hands behind his back, and ordered death row inmates to torture him. One death row inmate squeezed Hu Baochun's testicles, causing him excruciating pain. The prison policemen handcuffed Hu Baochun to a metal chair in order to force-feed him. They tied his hands and feet with steel wires. They pried open his mouth with a pair of pliers and poked them in his mouth, severely injuring his mouth and throat.

Unable to cope with one stress after another, Mr. Hu's sixty-eight-year-old mother suddenly showed symptoms of stroke, high blood pressure, atrophied cerebellum and partial paralysis. Consequently, she became disoriented and could no longer take care of her own personal needs. She lives on her meager pension, and she and Hu Baochun's twenty-year-old son are financially dependent on each other.

Wang Shengli, formerly the chief of the Discipline Department at Huludao Forced Labor Camp, used electric batons to shock and beat Falun Gong practitioners numerous times. He was later transferred to serve as instructor to the platoon in charge of handling Falun Gong practitioners. He subsequently contracted severe hepatitis and was hospitalized for surgery.

Zhang Fusheng, formerly a policeman from the Discipline Department at Huludao Forced Labor Camp, also known as "the meanest person in the labor camp," was promoted to deputy chief of the Discipline Department for persecuting Falun Gong practitioners. In 2003, he was terminated from his government job as a policeman after he was caught accepting bribes.

Guo Aiming, a policeman from the Discipline Department at Huludao Forced Labor Camp, shocked Falun Gong practitioners with electric batons numerous times. According to insiders, his nine-year-old son required surgery for a serious illness.

Wu Shushan, the deputy secretary of the Political Committee in the labor camp, connived with his subordinates in torturing Falun Gong practitioners. He became bedridden after suffering a stroke around the end of 2000, and since then, has been unable to work.

Xu Guoliang is a squadron chief in the 2nd Platoon at Huludao Forced Labor Camp. In early 2003 he assaulted Falun Gong practitioners. A few days later, a metal shard from an explosion cut into an artery on his neck when he was at work. Doctors from both Huludao and Shenyang Hospitals were unable to treat his condition. Later, when he went to Beijing for treatment, the blood clots had almost reached his chest, where they would have caused his death. Ever since then, Xu Guoliang has stopped assaulting practitioners and started treating everyone better.

Notes

1. Huludao Forced Labor Camp: 86-429-3125626.
2. An electrical baton resembles a wooden police club, but contains the equivalent high-voltage electrical charge of a stun gun. It burns skin on contact, is capable of inducing temporary paralysis to incapacitate the victim and, in some cases, may even cause the death of weaker victims.
3. Platoon leader Liu Guohua: 86-429-3182979 (home), 86-429-3110974 (office), 86-13352399697 (mobile).
4. With hands shackled and both feet in the air or only toes touching the ground, one is hung from the handcuffs tied with a rope to a basketball support or the beam of the house. The hands and arms will soon tingle then become numb.
5. Yuan is the basic unit of currency in China, where the average monthly income of an urban worker is 500 yuan.

Posting date: 8/29/2004
Original article date: 8/29/2004
Category: Eyewitness Accounts
Translated on 8/13/2004
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/7/29/80590.html