On July 6, 1999, an unbroken spell of drizzle enveloped the Sidi Village, Beigang Town, Tunliu County, Changzhi City, located in the southeast Shanxi Province. Uncle Li was worrying at home: His eldest son, Li Jinzhong, had not come back home since he left on the morning of July 4 with his Falun Gong friend Chang Haochi. And he remembered Chang Haochi had his head shaved exceptionally that day and said: "It's time to go to Paradise since we've already completed our cultivation." These words made him even more worried.
Just then, the villagers who kept watch in the millet field found two burnt bodies in the Sangshu Valley to the north of the village. Beside the bodies, there was a burnt plastic barrel with strong gas smell. Both bodies were burnt badly. One of them was facing up, two legs were bent into the sitting position; the other was prostrating and his arms were in the hugging position. Oddments of cloth in the waist of the faced-up body survived the burning, and some papers with words of Falun Gong remained in them. The field investigation excluded the possibility of the homicide. The police concluded that they burnt themselves to death. And the two bodies had been confirmed of 51-year-old Li Jinzhong and 27-year-old Chang Haochi.
Li Jinzhong returned to home village after his retirement in 1998. He had a pension of more than 700 Yuan every month. He ran a little pharmacy in the village with an income about 3,000 to 5,000 Yuan each year. The business of his family went well. But Li Jinzhong changed a lot after he became addicted to Falun Gong; he stopped caring about the villagers and sending medicine to them, but read Li Hongzhi's "scriptures" aloud in the yard. He even went to Shenyang of Liaoning Province to "get the scriptures" and brought back Li Hongzhi's books and video tapes. He not only read the scriptures and wrote down what he had learnt, but also spread it in the village, saying that he had taken lots of zigzag courses in his life before, but after he read Li Hongzhi's books, he returned to the correct road. 27-year-old Chang Haochi fell deep into Falun Gong in 1997 and often visited Li Jinzhong and practiced with him. For cultivation, he even quitted the oral defense of his thesis when he was attending the advantaged studies in the Shanxi Coal Management College.
Days before, the reporter met Uncle Li, Li Jinzhong's father, who was more than 80 years old. Although the tragedy occurred almost two years before, the sorrow was still clear in his face. "My son, how hard it was to bring you up. You just left, leaving your children and your wife in the pain. You left us unattended, even me, your own father. You made me hurt..." Uncle Li cried, then, "I hate, I hate Li Hongzhi's Falun Gong. It killed my son and ruined my family!" he cursed loudly.
