1994 - Zheng Musheng

January 6, 1994

Dongkou, Hunan

On the evening of January 5, 1994, evangelist Zheng Musheng participated in a house church meeting at his home at Moyan Village, Dongkou County, in south China’s Hunan Province. There were 21 believers in attendance. At about ten o’clock officers from the Public Security Bureau suddenly arrived and broke the meeting up before the participants could flee. The Christians were detained and questioned, and most were released after paying fines of 150 Yuan (US$ 18). Zheng, being the leader, was not afforded the same opportunity.

Zheng Musheng had only become a Christian in 1990, but the changes in his life after Christ took ownership were so dramatic that he could not keep the good news to himself. The police handcuffed him and took him to the local police station. He Ziben, the head of the district Public Security Bureau, and three other officers severely beat the evangelist after accusing him of raping 70 women. They also raided his home and confiscated all possessions they could carry off.[1]

The next day Zheng was taken to the Dongkou County PSB office, where ‘They denied him medical treatment, and so he died. His body was then sent to the morgue, with the officials claiming that he had been beaten to death by other prisoners.”[2] Zheng Musheng’s family were not notified of his death until eight days had passed. When they went to see the body,

“There were deep rope burns on his ankles, which indicated that he had been suspended in the air and beaten, a technique commonly employed by the PSB in extracting confessions. In addition, there were deep rope burns on his neck, and the area around his kidneys had numerous stab wounds made by a knife. The rest of his body had been beaten so badly that it had turned dark and the flesh was putrefying.

The autopsy found that Zheng had no diseases, thus proving that he died from the beating he received. Moreover, the authorities had all of the organs and intestines removed from the body during the autopsy…because, in their words, ‘this man believed in Jesus and believed he would rise from the dead,’ and so they wanted to make sure that he would not.”[3]

The Dongkou authorities offered Zheng’s family 8,000 Yuan (approximately US$950) and the Huangni police offered a further 1,000 Yuan (US$125) if they would sign a document granting them permission to cremate the body. Zheng’s wife rejected the offer, so the authorities simply signed it themselves and had the body cremated to destroy the evidence of their crimes. Even Bridge magazine, a publication endorsed by the state-sanctioned Three-Self Patriotic Movement, strongly criticized the killing of Zheng. It noted:

“Zheng was converted in 1990. Afterwards he preached in…the Shanmen District. He always was careful not to offend the regulations. Yet in spite of his efforts to be law-abiding, he was killed. If he could be blamed to preach without the permission of the government, it was still not for the government to beat him to death without any regard for the law. Not only that, the Shizhu township government illegally took away everything from his home: money, food, beds and furniture. Zheng has a mother who is 80-years-old, and a very young child. A family of four, now without the chief bread-winner, is left to starvation.”[4]

Overwhelmed with the evil perpetrated against her husband, Zheng’s wife Yin Dongxiu suffered a nervous breakdown. On March 3o, 1994, the Chinese government finally acknowledged that Zheng Musheng had died in custody, but said claims he had died at the hands of the Public Security Bureau were “a fabrication.”

The government claimed Zheng had been beaten to death by other prisoners because he had been “disobedient and failed to clean the cell.”[5] The government then cowardly used the rest of the article to slander the dead man, claiming he had defrauded many people of their money and had “severely disrupted the social order.” Zheng’s wife later initiated a lawsuit against the Public Security Bureau in an attempt to hold them responsible for her husband’s death. She faced frequent police harassment and threats. The lawsuit was stalled in the courts and nothing was ever done.

1. China News and Church Report (March 11, 1994).
2. China News and Church Report (March 11, 1994).
3. China News and Church Report (March 11, 1994).
4. “An Evangelist Beaten to Death,” Bridge (1994, exact date misplaced), 13.
5. China News and Church Report (April 8, 1994).