Woman Dies in Police Custody While on Hunger Strike to Protest the Illegal Detention
(12/3/2002  2:30)

Prior to the Chinese Communist Party 16th National Congress in November, Pingshan County Public Security Bureau in Hebei Province arrested 5 homeless Falun Gong practitioners. While in police custody, 52-year old female practitioner Ms. Ruizhu Kang died after being on a hunger strike for 11 days.

Ms. Kang, a former employee of Pingshan County Chemical Fertilizer Plant in Hebei Province, was detained and fined after traveling to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong on April 25th, 1999 and July 20th, 1999. During a third trip during the 2000 Chinese New Year she was detained again and lost her job. In May 2001, Ms. Kang was reported to police for distributing informational materials about Falun Gong and was arrested and sent to Shijiazhuang City Labor Camp, but they refused to accept her.

In August 2001, Ms. Kang was kidnapped and taken to a brainwashing class where she was handcuffed to a tree for one week. She managed to escape from the brainwashing class, but was forced into homelessness due to continuous illegal detention.

On October 15th 2002, she was kidnapped off of the street and detained in a Huishe Town government building, and went on a hunger strike to protest her illegal detention. Police reportedly told her that, “It counts as suicide if we beat you to death. No matter how you die, you died of suicide. This is the order from above.”

On October 27th, news from the Pingshan County government and Public Security Bureau released information that Ms. Kang had died. She was secretly cremated by police on the same day, and her ashes were kept in the crematorium. County Committee Secretary Zhao Xinchao and 610 Office Chief Wang Genting issued official orders to cut off Ms. Kang’s family members’ wages and in an attempt to prevent them from taking any action regarding Kang’s case. Three other homeless practitioners who were arrested at the same time, Zhang Yingtong, Cui Hongzhi and Cui Changjiang, are still in detention and remain on hunger strike. (12/3/2002  2:30)

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