FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - 10/13/2001 [ http://www.faluninfo.net/ ]

NEW YORK, October 13, 2001 (Falun Dafa Information Center) - Two more Falun Gong practitioners are verified to have died as a result of mistreatment while in custody.

A 32-year old woman died in Qianan City, Hebei Province, February 22, 2001 from injuries sustained during relentless police beatings. The woman, who refused to reveal her name to her police torturers, was arrested in Beijing during the Chinese New Year in February, 2001, after traveling there to protest the government's ongoing campaign of terror against Falun Gong.

She was sent by the Beijing Public Security Bureau to be detained temporarily in Cuizhuang Detention center in Qianan, where she was brutally beaten by police. On February 18, she was battered from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m. Witnesses say that afterwards, her body was covered with open wounds; she left a trail of blood on the ground as she was dragged back to her cell. Witnesses could see that the eyelashes and eyebrows of her left eye had all been plucked out, her nose was burned as if by a flame, and her blood soaked socks were stuck to her heel bones.

Despite the critical nature of her injuries, police guards kept her locked in her cell without medical attention until she lost consciousness on February 20. She was sent then to the local hospital, but died from her injuries on February 22. Police immediately cremated her body. The cause of death was recorded as "cerebral thrombosis."

Throughout her ordeal, she apparently refused to reveal her name or home address. In numerous similar cases, police have been known to harass, fine, and even imprison family members and friends of Falun Gong practitioners. Information on this case was able to make it outside China only this week, as the police had arrested dozens of Falun Gong practitioners in the area and adjoining areas in attempts to suppress news of the wrongful death. This woman is at least the 24th practitioner to die in Hebei Province since the beginning of the regime's campaign.

In a second case, Ms. Yu Biqing from Yongquan Town, Wenjiang County, Sichuan Province died in the afternoon of September 25, 2001, from injuries sustained during what seems to have been an attempt to escape almost certain torture at the hands of police.

Yu and another female Falun Gong practitioner with the last name Zhou apparently jumped out of a police vehicle that was transporting them from Dujiangyan City Public Security Bureau to Liujie Police Station. Zhou jumped first and ran into the woods along the road and hid until it was dark. Sources say she sustained head injuries during the jump, but eventually found her way home. Yu Biqing jumped next, but apparently died on impact.

Witnesses say they saw what seemed to be a "big parcel" fall from the police vehicle, but the car continued on without stopping.

Witness say they ran to the scene and found Yu already dead. Later a police emergency vehicle took Yu to the Dujiangyan City Funeral Home, where other practitioners identified her.

The total number of documented deaths from the two-year-plus persecution of Falun Gong in China has now reached 295, although government sources inside China disclose that the actual number exceeds 1,000.

More than 100,000 Falun Gong practitioners have been illegally arrested and detained since communist chief Jiang Zemin banned the peaceful spiritual practice in July of 1999. At least 20,000 have been sent to labor camps without trial, and thousands more have been illegally confined in mental hospitals where they are tortured and abused.