Yu Wensheng’s wife, Xu Yan, tweeted on April 16 that she had mailed Nanjing Prison a request for inpatient treatment, medical parole, once-a-month visitation rights, and a transfer to a different cell block. She had just visited with Yu’s brother and learned that Yu had been beaten in a group when he first entered the prison and had recently been seen for nerve damage.
In a tweet, Xu Yan revealed that she went to Nanjing Prison on April 15 with Yu Wensheng’s lawyer brother to visit her husband by video for about 30 minutes. Xu Yan learned through this visit that Nanjing Prison had taken Yu Wensheng to the orthopedic and neurosurgery department, and the orthopedic doctor said that the hand tremors were caused by trauma and nerve damage, and Xu Yan demanded an investigation and accountability for why Yu Wensheng’s hand was injured; Yu Wensheng was placed in the elderly section, which is full of old, weak and disabled people over 65 years old, as well as hepatitis B patients, and is a non-exercise elderly section. Yu Wensheng thought this was abusive to him and asked to be transferred to a different section.
Xu Yan wrote, “When lawyer Yu Wensheng first arrived at Nanjing prison, he was beaten by a group of people who beat him together, and I demanded that this be investigated and held accountable.” “It has been nearly three months since he was admitted to prison, but he is still not allowed to buy anything, he is not provided with paper and pencil, he is not free to read books, and so far he has not been given a family call.”
The day after the visit, Xu Yan mailed to Nanjing prison on Yu Wensheng lawyer inpatient treatment application, application for medical parole, once a month visitation rights application, application for transfer to the prison area, asking Nanjing prison to help carefully consider and give consent decision. She has planned to take her son to visit the prison next month, hoping that the prison authorities and relevant departments, “from the perspective of love and care of minors to give affectionate visits”.
Xu Yan visited her husband in prison on March 15 and said afterwards that Yu’s right hand was trembling badly, and that he had difficulty buttoning up his shirt in addition to being unable to write. She urged the authorities to allow him to be released on medical bail at that time. Yu also mentioned at the time that the detention center only let him drink water in the morning, and only let him drink hot water in the recent cold weather.
Originally a business lawyer in Beijing, Yu was illegally detained for 99 days by the Chinese Communist Party in 2014 for his support of the “Occupy” movement in Hong Kong and was tortured and persecuted. After his release from prison, he joined the China Human Rights Lawyers Group and began following human rights cases.
After the mass arrests of human rights lawyers in 2015, Yu had the opportunity to leave China, but he chose to stay, hoping to do his part in moving China toward the rule of law.
Yu was arrested in January 2018 after publishing an open letter proposing constitutional amendments, calling for fair elections and the establishment of a monitoring system for the Chinese Communist Party, and has been detained since. He was sentenced to four years in prison on June 17 last year for “inciting subversion of state power.” He appealed the first instance verdict at the end of the same year, but Xu Yan received a criminal ruling from the Jiangsu Provincial High Court of the Communist Party of China on Dec. 26 last year, informing him that the court had upheld the first instance verdict. In January, Xu Yan was able to see her husband via video from the Xuzhou City Detention Center. It was the couple’s first meeting since Yu Wensheng’s incarceration nearly three years ago.
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