Policeman Involved in Religious Suppression Embraces the Persecuted Faith, Gets Tortured and Injected With Drugs

The drug has rendered the veteran officer's intelligence level to that of a three-year-old
By Jocelyn Neo
Jocelyn Neo
Jocelyn Neo
Jocelyn Neo writes about China-related topics and stories on life that inspire hope and humanity.
May 8, 2023Updated: May 8, 2023

A veteran police officer in China who once followed the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) orders to persecute Falun Gong adherents nearly lost his life on facing the same persecution after he began practicing the peaceful meditative system himself.

Before his release, the prison authorities injected him with a nerve-damaging drug in their last-ditch effort to stop him from revealing “state secrets”: the horrors of practicing faith under tyrannical rule.

Officer Gao Yumin of Fuxin City, Liaoning Province, has more than 20 years of experience in the criminal investigation division of the Fuxin City Police Department. After the CCP initiated an unprecedented persecution of Falun Gong on July 20, 1999—declaring the law-abiding adherents as “state enemies”—Gao, like any other law enforcement officer, got officially involved in the violent suppression of the faith.

However, after his frequent on-duty interactions with Falun Gong practitioners who, despite the persecution, stand firm to their faith in the universal values of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance, Gao was moved by their kindness and perseverance. When he received some informational materials at his doorstep about the spiritual practice, he developed a deep admiration for the resilient adherents and the practice’s moral teachings—and started practicing Falun Gong.

And soon he was subjected to the same brutality that he’d felt duty-bound to carry out.

Epoch Times Photo
Chinese police officers arrest a Falun Gong practitioner at Tiananmen Square in Beijing on Jan. 10, 2000. (Chien-Min Chung/AP Photo)

Gao was arrested for distributing Falun Gong materials and raising awareness about the persecution in November 2013, according to Minghui.org, a U.S.-based nonprofit website dedicated to the reporting of the persecution in China. While in detention, Gao went on a hunger strike and was beaten and tortured. He was released on medical parole two months later only to be arrested again in February 2014.

He was sentenced to five years in prison, which was reduced to three and a half years after he appealed.

However, two months before Gao was scheduled to be released in 2018, the prison authorities injected him with a high dose of a nerve-damaging drug and beat him until he lost consciousness. His family only learned of his ordeal after he was admitted to the hospital where he remained unconscious for nine days.

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A police officer, who was not misled by the CCP’s propaganda and had been quietly protecting Falun Gong adherents, hinted to the family that they should get a urine test done; the results showed the drug dosage was “high enough to poison him.” The drug rendered Gao’s intelligence to that of a 3-year-old and he is now dependent on his family for care.

Unfortunately, in the 24-year-long persecution, Gao is not the only law enforcement personnel who has faced this tragic end.

Epoch Times Photo
Chinese plain-clothes policemen arrest a Falun Gong practitioner in Tiananmen Square in Beijing as a crowd watches on Oct. 1, 2000. (Chien-min Chung/AP Photo)

According to another Minghui report, a labor camp guard-turned-Falun Gong practitioner also suffered the same fate.

Cui Huifang, a woman in her 50s from Jiamusi City, Heilongjiang Province, was a guard at Jiamusi City Forced Labor Camp when the persecution of Falun Gong started. Brainwashed by the CCP’s propaganda, just like Gao, Cui was actively involved in torturing Falun Gong practitioners.

In a report submitted to Minghui.org by Cui’s friend, Cui recounted how she once violently pushed down and sat on several Falun Gong practitioners who were doing the meditative exercises in the labor camp. Another time, she punched a nearly 70-year-old adherent for practicing the exercises, causing the elderly woman to fall back and hit the bed.

Chinese policewoman
Cui Huifang, a retired labor camp guard-turned-Falun Gong practitioner. (Courtesy of Minghui.org)

Gradually, interacting with the imprisoned adherents and hearing how they benefitted from the practice, Cui experienced a change of heart.

One day, the head of the labor camp handed Cui the main book of Falun Gong—”Zhuan Falun”—asking her to read it well so that she and her colleagues can effectively “re-educate” the practitioners and make them give up their faith. After Cui began reading the spiritual and moral teachings of Falun Gong, she was moved by the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance; she gradually quit her bad habits and her health also improved. Experiencing the benefits firsthand, Cui was convinced that Falun Gong is an upright practice, and that the Chinese regime is bent on defaming it for ulterior goals.

However, Cui was arrested in December 2014 after she tried to attend a trial of practitioners arrested in Jiansanjiang, Heilongjiang Province, in March of that year. She was released on the same day but arrested again in February 2015 when she was on her way home after applying for a visa at the United States embassy in Shenyang City.

Cui was later charged with “disclosing state secrets” and sentenced to two years, reported Minghui.org. She was released in February 2017.