The Dui Hua Foundation recently received an update on the status of Li Jianfeng (李建峰), a 47-year-old labor activist and former judge from Ningde, Fujian Province, sentenced to 16 years in prison on subversion and weapons charges in 2003. According to information provided to Dui Hua by a reliable source, Li’s sentence was reduced by 21 months sometime in either late 2009 or 2010. He is now due for release from Jianyang Prison on February 2, 2015.
Prosecutors charged Li and seven other defendants with organizing, in 2000, an illegal “labor union” called the “Labor and Employment Research Association” and plotting to shoot out the windows of the chief judge of the Ningde Intermediate People’s Court. The defendants denied the charges and claimed that police trying to frame them had committed torture and fabricated evidence.
This is the second sentence reduction for Li Jianfeng, who had 17 months knocked off his sentence in December 2007. His case has been raised by Dui Hua on a several prisoner lists since 2004. The other individuals sentenced with Li have all been released, most after receiving sentence reductions