Police Violence
After police beat her, her aunt rushed over from the countryside. While police forced her aunt to sign a document saying she would take her niece away, the young girl again insisted that the police release her mother.
The police head then ordered two policemen to drag the girl over to him. Her aunt tried to hold on to the girls’ hands, refusing to let her go, but the policeman hit the girl in the face. She fell to the ground. From there, more beatings ensued: police officers dragged her into another room. One of the police officers, Yuang Chunlei, repeatedly hit and kicked the girl dozens of times.
The young girl remained dazed for the remainder of the afternoon. Police threatened her, saying that if she asked again for her mother’s release, they would send her to juvenile prison.
Who was her mother? And why was there such a violent, reaction from the police?
Her Mother’s Story
The young girl’s mother, Zhang Libo, 38, owned a tailor shop, which she had opened to support herself and her daughter. Her own parents died when she was young, and her husband divorced her when their daughter was 8 months old. In 1998, Ms. Libo began to practice Falun Gong, a practice based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance.
When the Chinese regime launched its persecution against Falun Gong in 1999, arrests and torture became a regular method to try and “eliminate” those who practice it, as ordered by Jiang Zemin, the former head of the CCP (China’s regime, the Chinese Communist Party).
The CCP had also accompanied the persecution with a massive propaganda campaign to try and justify its persecution of Falun Gong. In response, Ms. Libo had begun distributing pamphlets that told the real story of Falun Gong, explaining how the CCP slandered and persecuted the practice. Soon after she was abducted by police and nearly beaten to death. After her detainment, she was later illegally sentenced to one year in a forced labor camp.
The Olympics Are Coming
In the months approaching the summer Olympics, the CCP stepped up its efforts to round up and arrest Falun Gong practitioners.
On May 27, 2008, Zhang was abducted again from a supermarket by Yuang Chunlei, the policeman who would later beat her daughter.
Courage in Hand
With her 14-year-old daughter left behind without any means of care or support, and three months to go before the school year started, there was no money to pay for the tuition. The room that she and her mother occupied was also rented out to other tenants, because she could not pay for it.
It was under these circumstances, with no money for school, rent, or living expenses, that the young girl got up her courage and went to the Linjiang Street Police Station with luggage in hand and asked for her mother’s release.
The first time she went to the police station, the head threatened to inform the school dean of her whereabouts. He then instructed her to bring in her aunt to sign a document. The police station head told her he would talk to the bureau chief about her mother’s release, and forcefully dropped her off at her former neighbor’s home.
The next day, she came again to the station. It was then that police severely beat her.
What Now?
Even though her aunt has taken her in, the girl has no home, and no school where she can go.
Zhang’s relatives are farmers, who only have an annual income of 4,000-5,000 yuan (approximately US$ 600-700). The cost of school tuition and living expenses is about 8,000 yuan ($1,170) a year.
