(Minghui.org) The lawyer for two Maoming City, Guangdong Province, residents who face indictment for practicing Falun Gong was not given an electronic version of their case file. The procuratorate receptionist also denied his request to take photos of the paper documents and left him waiting for hours without addressing his question.
Falun Gong is a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.
Ms. Wang Ying, around 64, and Ms. Tao Yonghong, 63, were arrested on December 13, 2023 and have since been held at the Maoming City First Detention Center.
The Maonan District Procuratorate issued formal arrest warrants for the two women on January 20, 2024 and received their joint case file from the police at the end of March 2024. Prosecutor Yang Xiande (+86-15119704280) was assigned to the case.
Ms. Wang and Ms. Tao hired an out-of-town lawyer to represent them. The lawyer traveled to Maoming City on April 2, 2024 to review his clients’ case file at the Maonan District Procuratorate. Receptionist Chen Guandi said she needed to consult higher-ups and asked him to wait. More than one hour later, she returned to say that there was no electronic file and that the lawyer could only review the paper documents.
The lawyer was surprised because case files are now all in electronic formats. While he was waiting for Chen to return to the reception window, he saw about seven other lawyers given DVDs containing their clients’ electronic files a few minutes after they came.
Without electronic files to review, the lawyer requested to take photos of the paper documents. When Chen refused the lawyer demanded to see her supervisor. She went to “consult higher-ups” again but never returned to the window. The lawyer waited several more hours, during which time Tan Yu, another receptionist, refused to talk to him or answer his questions.
The lawyer ended up having to leave Maoming City without reviewing Ms. Wang and Ms. Tao’s case file.
Past Persecution
This is not the first time that Ms. Wang and Ms. Tao have been targeted for their faith.
Ms. Wang was a jade expert and an engineer at Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences. She served two years of forced labor and three years in prison for practicing Falun Gong. Her employer fired her in May 2011 after she was released from prison. They also reduced her years of service to zero from her pension calculation, resulting in her completely losing her retirement benefits.
Ms. Tao is a retiree of Sinopec Maoming Petrochemical Company. She served three years in prison for her faith (2011-2014) and was briefly detained on several occasions. Around June 2022, the local social security office ordered Ms. Tao to pay back more than 102,000 yuan in pension benefits (including about 50,000 yuan in payments issued during her three-year prison term and more than 52,000 yuan in annual benefit increase she received since her prison release). They threatened to suspend her future pension if she did not comply. It is unclear whether she paid the money as ordered.
When Ms. Tao was not incarcerated, she and her mother faced constant harassment from the authorities.
Related Report:
Two Guangdong Women in Detention for Their Faith in Falun Gong, Both Previously Jailed for 3 Years
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