In July 2017, The Church of Almighty God middle-level leader Yang Meiyun was arrested by the CCP. This year, she was given 11 years’ imprisonment. Up to September 2019, this is the longest prison term among The Church of Almighty God Christians who were sentenced to prison this year.
Yang Meiyun (pseudonym Yao Zhen), female, was born on September 21, 1979 in Yichun City, Jiangxi Province. She joined The Church of Almighty God in 2007. At her arrest she served as a middle-level leader of the Church.
On the afternoon of July 2, 2017, Yang Meiyun and another Christian were arrested when they were boarding the train at Quzhou railway station in Zhejiang Province by the police of Keshan Branch of Quzhou Public Security Bureau.
On the morning of July 6, two village cadres led four police officers from a public security police station of Quzhou City and that of Yichun City to the home of Yang Meiyun’s parents in Yichun City, asking about Yang’s belief in God and her family members’ belief, but to no avail. Soon the police from a public security police station in Quzhou City went to the village where Yang’s parents lived again, and said to her father, “Your daughter is a leader of The Church of Almighty God of Zhejiang Province.” They also questioned him on how long Yang had believed in God and who else in their family believed in God, which was fruitless, and they left at last.
On July 28, Yang Meiyun was criminally detained by the Keshan Branch of Quzhou Public Security Bureau on suspicion of “organizing and using a xie jiao organization to undermine the enforcement of the law” and held at the Quzhou Detention Center.
In 2019, Qujiang District People’s Court of Quzhou City held a hearing on the case without notifying Yang Meiyun’s family of appearing at the court, and sentenced Yang to 11 years in prison in accordance with Article 300, paragraph 1 and other provisions of the Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China on the charge of “organizing and using a xie jiao organization to undermine the enforcement of the law.”
On June 20 of the same year, Yang Meiyun was escorted to the Zhejiang Provincial No.2 Women’s Prison where she still remain.