On July 20, 1999, Lanzhou City police arrested four Falun Gong practitioners. Mr. Yu Jinfang, 59 years old, a retired worker of the 2^nd Auto Maintenance Factory of Gansu Province, together with other practitioners went to the provincial government to appeal for Falun Gong and demand the release of the detained practitioners. For doing this, he was detained for six months and his workplace stopped paying his monthly pension of 400 Yuan. It wasn't until January 20, 2000 that he was released.

At the end of 2000, Mr. Yu went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. Police arrested him at his temporary home in Beijing and brutally tortured him. Police used high voltage electric batons to shock and burn his face, leaving his mouth full of large blisters. After being detained in Dongguancun Police Station for twenty days, Mr. Yu was escorted back to Lanzhou City. He was then detained for another 15 days in Tiaoshupin Detention Center.

On November 12, 2001, when the International Human Rights representative visited China in 2001, police abducted Mr. Yu and his wife, Ms. Xia Fuying (59 years old), in fear that they might appeal for Falun Gong. At 3 p.m. on December 11, 2001, policeman Lu Zhibing from the first section of Lanzhou City Public Security Bureau at Chengguan District and a group of officers broke into Yu's home. They took away Yu Jinfang, Yu's wife,  their third daughter, their son-in-law and their maid. Mr. Yu was detained in Yuzhong County Detention Center in Gansu Province on December 11, 2001. Police tied him up on an iron bed frame to interrogate him for four days and nights. After he suffered more than ten days of torture, the detention police informed his family that Mr. Yu had been hospitalized at Recovery Center Hospital of Dashapin Forced Labor Camp in Lanzhou City, with a bleeding stomach ulcer. When Mr. Yu was released from the hospital in April 2002, the official of the first section of Public Security Bureau who handled his release process extorted 4,000 Yuan from his family. Later, Mr. Yu was sent to Dashapin Detention Center for two months. Up until June 2003, Mr. Yu lived in an extremely deteriorated situation. The extended period of sleeping on a cold and wet floor left his body covered with scabies and running, bleeding sores. His body had not one patch of healthy skin. In the final two months of torture, he was on the verge of death. He had a constant high fever and was unable to take in any food or water. In March 2003, Mr. Yu's daughter handed in 2,000 Yuan to the Recovery Center Hospital to get him to be accepted by the hospital. Within a month, Mr. Yu was sent back to the detention center to be tortured again. Under the family's repeated request, he was allowed to stay in the hospital after his family was forced to pay 4,000 Yuan. It has been over three months since Mr. Yu was hospitalized; yet the torture and persecution against him continues and he shows no sign of recovery.