CAT/C/53/D/511/2012 started arresting all of the Falun Gong practitioners. They forcefully pulled and dragged them up to the car, without showing an arrest warrant or documents to prove their affiliation with the police. All the practitioners were taken to a nearby police station and were severely beaten by the police officers. One of the police officers interrogated the complainant, asking her to provide “the names of practitioners at [her] practice place”. The complainant did not respond. During the questioning, the policeman physically assaulted the complainant, repeatedly beating her on her head and face and causing her to become dizzy and faint. She does not remember how many times he hit her. He also kicked her and trampled her until he was tired and could not continue. 2.8 On the same night, at around 1 or 2 a.m., the police transferred the complainant to Beijing Xicheng District Police Department Detention Centre. There, she was locked up with approximately 17 criminals in a cell of 13–14 square metres. The police forbade her to sleep during the night: she was forced to stand facing the wall and recite the rules and regulations of the prison. If she dozed off and the prison supervisor saw her from the surveillance camera, the supervisor would scold loudly or order the criminals in the cell to take turns watching over the complainant. The criminal prisoners forced her to bend her back at a right angle and stand with both her arms raised high behind and with her head bent towards the floor. They called this position “flying the aeroplane”. As a result of being inverted, the complainant’s face swelled up, her waist and arms began to hurt, and her legs shook. If she changed position a little, the prisoners would beat her. The police officers also confiscated her money, taking the cash that she had on her as compensation for her prison blanket. When the police officers brought the blanket to the cell, the other prisoners hid it and she did not obtain a replacement blanket. The police officers, while interrogating her on both days of her detention, forced her to squat for long periods, causing her legs to go numb and then feel painful. They only gave her small steamed buns and black vegetable soup to eat. 2.9 On the night of 28 January 2000, the complainant was escorted back to Rendinghu police station. The police officers arranged for three males, who did not wear the police uniform, to monitor her and prevent her from sleeping. They also followed her to the toilet. 2.10 The complainant managed to escape from the Rendinghu police station on 29 January 2000. At around 5 a.m., she went to the washroom, opened the window, and jumped out quietly from the second floor. She reached the ground without any injuries. She walked away, in view of the guards at the entrance. By coincidence, she saw a taxi waiting outside the station and took it. She then contacted her husband and reunited with him. 2.11 On 4 February 2000, the complainant, her husband and three friends were celebrating the traditional spring festival over lunch in a restaurant in Maquan when several plain-clothes police officers swarmed the restaurant and arrested all five friends, including one non-practitioner. They were sent to the Hai Dian District National Security Department, where they were prevented from sleeping during the night. The next day, they were sent to the Beijing Police Department Detention Centre, which was generally regarded as a place for criminals having committed the most serious offences. The complainant and her husband were separated into gender-specific cells. The police forced the complainant to remove her shoes and stand on the frozen cement floor in the cold winter temperatures. Three or four police officers took turns interrogating her over a period of 24 hours. They padlocked her to a chair and handcuffed her arms so that she could not move. When she closed her eyes out of fatigue, the police officers would scold her loudly. On 5 February 2000, Chinese New Year’s Day, the Secretary of the Central Political and Legislative Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, Luo Gan, came to the detention centre and accused the complainant of “disrupt[ing] public order, destroy[ing] China’s stability and unity” by going to Tiananmen Square on Chinese New Year’s Eve. She immediately responded, “Tiananmen Square belongs to the people; everyone has the right to go. Some 4