Death of Dafa Practitioner Zhang Tao in the Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp

Zhang Tao was a fifty-year-old male Dafa practitioner who lived in Shuangcheng City, Heilongjiang Province. He was illegally detained at the Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp many times for appealing on behalf of Falun Dafa. In July 2002, Zhang Tao held a hunger strike in the forced labour camp to protest the persecution and was force-fed an unknown drug, which caused vomiting and diarrhoea. Zhang Tao also experienced a severe rise in body temperature. Even under such circumstances, Zhang Tao was still sent to a solitary compartment, where he was handcuffed and hung up in the air until he lost consciousness. He was then finally sent to the Wanjia Hospital. Zhang Tao passed away the next day.

In June 2002, Division Three of the forced labour camp illegally imprisoned the Dafa practitioners who were sent to the forced labour camp for a second time. The practitioners resisted the persecution, so everyday there were practitioners being put into solitary compartments. The practitioners went on a hunger strike, never yielding to the persecution.

In order to strictly control Dafa practitioners, the labour camp head Shi Changjing often abuses them under various excuses. Practitioners in Team Four were handcuffed to a bed pole day and night, because they refused to put on ID cards and labour camp uniforms worn by criminals. In June, practitioners in Team Three were sent into solitary compartments and brutally beaten by Team Leader Wang Zhanqi for refusing to answer roll call. Dafa practitioners Li Hongbin, Zhang Tao, Gao Ke, Li Zhong, and Yun Fuqi held a group hunger strike, and Team Leader Wang Zhanqi tortured them mercilessly. Since the practitioners were extremely weak after the hunger strike, they could not sit up, so they lay on the ground on top of their own clothes. Wang Zhanqi forcefully took away the practitioners' clothes and forced the practitioners to lie on the bare, icy-cold ground. The guards also force-fed practitioners with an unknown drug, which caused the practitioners to vomit violently, and their body temperature to rise drastically. They were then thrown into solitary compartments, handcuffed and hung up in the air. Dafa practitioners Zhang Tao and Li Hongbin were tortured this way. It was not until they passed out that they were sent to the distant Wanjia Hospital instead of a local hospital for so-called "emergency treatment." In July, Zhang Tao passed away at 8:30 a.m. on the second day he was admitted into the hospital, and Li Hongbin passed away on July 14 in the Wanjia Hospital [see the report at http://www.clearharmony.net/articles/200207/5833.html].

The staff at the Wanjia Hospital brutally beat and force-fed the Dafa practitioners. Practitioner Gao Ke was beaten in the Wanjia Hospital until he lost consciousness as well as control of his bladder. He was on the verge of death. Later, it was learned that the "610 Office" had given the order that practitioners who hold hunger strikes are to be tortured to death and should never be released.

http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2002/9/29/27037.html