Recent reports have brought to light the notorious issue of black prisons in Shanghai, where petitioners have been suffering tremendously. Black prisons are shadowy detention centers operated by local governments, employing civilians to kidnap, detain, and guard petitioners. These black security personnel often resort to violence against the petitioners, going as far as poisoning their food or injecting them with drugs, making their lives a living nightmare.
One petitioner, Cui Qun from Jiaxing Street, Hongkou District in Shanghai, who recently emerged from a black prison, faced a lack of response when she tried to report her ordeal to the police. Instead, she was arrogantly told, “We won’t accept it, go ahead and sue me.”
During the Fourth Plenary Session of the Communist Party of China on October 22, Cui Qun was forced to line up at the National Petition Office, only to be forcibly taken to Jiujing Zhuang for detention and then intercepted and sent back by the “Shanghai Office in Beijing” for repatriation. Upon her return to Shanghai on October 23, she was immediately taken to the Jiaxing Police Station in Hongkou District. Despite pointing out procedural violations, the police ignored her plea, confiscated her ID, pushed aside her luggage, and restricted her movements with the help of auxiliary police.
That evening around 8 o’clock, three unidentified individuals kidnapped her from the police station to the HanTing hotel on Zhoujiazhui Road in Hongkou District. During her captivity, the black security personnel conducted body searches, confiscated her phone and luggage, cut off her communication with the outside world, and had two female guards monitoring her closely.
On October 27, around 6:30 in the evening, she was finally released and immediately called the emergency hotline. On October 29, she went to the Jiaxing Police Station at the HanTing hotel to report the incident, but the police (with badge number 036692) refused to accept her complaint, simply saying, “We won’t accept it, go ahead and sue me.”
Cui Qun shared, “While I was under restriction, my family reported the case every day and went to the police station for inquiries. However, the police at the Jiaxing Police Station claimed the reports were false, insisting that the situation was part of a ‘study program’ organized by the street office.”
Cui Qun, a citizen from Jiaxing Street, Hongkou District, Shanghai, had her house unlawfully requisitioned in 2015. Despite the surrounding market value in 2015, the compensation provided by the demolition party did not meet her rightful entitlement to on-site relocation. Consequently, Cui Qun has been on a futile journey of petitioning and appeals against the authorities’ continuous oppression through black prisons.
According to Cui Qun’s records, from 2017 to 2025, she has been unlawfully detained in black prisons (such as the 751 base and the HanTing hotel) twelve times by the joint efforts of the Hongkou Sub-Bureau and the Hongkou District Government, totaling a whopping 301 days of captivity.
Another petitioner, Yang Xiuting from Pudong New Area in Shanghai, has been under house arrest for over 100 days since July 9 this year. Despite making 82 complaints to Shanghai’s 12345 hotline and reporting to the police 4 times at 110, the black security personnel are still present in her residential compound, refusing to leave.
Yang Xiuting told a reporter, “Yesterday, when I tried to go out, I was intercepted. I called 110, the police arrived, and I demanded to verify the identity of the other party, their employer, and the purpose of interception. They admitted the employer was Kangqiao Town Government, sent by the Hengmian Police Station.”
She explained, “They stated that the interception was to prevent me from petitioning. The police initially intended to take the other party to the police station for verification but later insisted that I accompany them. Their real intention was to trick me out of the compound for potential abduction. I refused and requested to go with a friend.”
For the past 13 years, Yang Xiuting has not received any compensation for the unlawful demolition of her house nor a single square meter of housing as compensation. Her persistent petitioning and rights defense efforts have resulted in prolonged persecution through bouts of house arrest and black prison detention, accumulating a total of 469 days since 2018.
Yang Xiuting has also experienced being handed over to black security by the police inside the police station, leading to her detention in a black prison.
On September 25, 2023, while heading to court to participate in a lawsuit, she was kidnapped and handed over to black security by the police at the police station. She was then taken to the black prison at Chongming Yufan Farm for detention, where she was injected with a toxic substance. After being detained for 47 days, she was left unable to walk and was eventually rescued by a passerby who called an ambulance to take her to the hospital.
In March 2018, after being kidnapped in Beijing, she was detained in the black prison at Chongming Huanghao Hotel, where she was forced to eat designated meals suspected of being poisoned. She recalled, “Before entering the black prison, I had a mouth full of teeth, but upon release, I had lost 19 teeth.”
In October 2019, she was kidnapped again and taken to the black prison at Chongming Huanghao Hotel before being transferred to the black prison at Chongming Juyuan. This time, besides suffering severe physical injuries from the beating, she also lost 6 more teeth.
In early 2020, shortly after the Chinese New Year, she was once more forcibly taken to a black prison, where she was bound and injected with a toxic substance twice. Each injection caused her to stay awake for three days and nights, experiencing heightened brain activity and severe itching on her skin. “After 19 days of captivity without water, I was abandoned on the roadside. I crawled to the street with the help of a tree branch to seek rescue!”
Yang Xiuting expressed, “This year, two individuals in Shanghai have already died in black prisons. I dare not venture outside now, as their surveillance is aimed at kidnapping me and sending me to a black prison.”