Ms. Xu Xiuju, in her 30’s, was a group leader of an Industrial and Commerce Bank in the Jingxing Mine District of Shijiazhuang City, Hebei Province. After she started practicing Falun Gong, Ms. Xu experienced improvement in her physical and mental health. In the summer of 2000, she went to Beijing to appeal to the government to stop the persecution of Falun Gong. While in Beijing, she was arrested and brought back to Shijiazhuang City. She was detained in the Jingxing Mine District Detention Center for one month, where guards beat her and threatened her. She was forced to remain in a squatting position until she fainted. After her release, her employer sent people to monitor her activities 24 hours a day.

In January 2001, local police invaded Ms. Xu’s home, confiscated her belongings, and took her once again to the Jingxing Mine District Detention Center. She went on a hunger strike to protest the detention, and was then subjected to force-feeding. After 20 days of detention, she was released and again placed under 24-hour surveillance.

In the summer of 2001, because Ms. Xu went to Beijing to appeal again, she was again detained in the Jingxing Mine District Detention Center, where guards kept her four limbs cuffed to the four corners of a bed continuously for more than one month. As a result, she was forced to relieve herself while lying in the bed. Ms. Xu was later sentenced to two years of forced labor and transferred to the Shijiazhuang Labor Camp, where she suffered more inhuman and long-lasting torture, until finally her spirit broke and she suffered a mental collapse. Despite the mental and emotional trauma she had already suffered, a female guard continued to torture her by hanging her up by a rope. Ms. Xu’s feet eventually became swollen through this very painful torture.