On March 8, 2025, a shocking incident took place in a village bank in Henan, China. Hu Weiming, a depositor, was secretly tried and sentenced for demanding her deposit back, leading to her imprisonment for 321 days. It wasn’t until New Year’s Eve this year that she was finally released. In a video released on March 6, she recounted the harrowing experience of being persecuted and unfairly sentenced.
Hu Weiming, a businesswoman from Zhejiang in her sixties, found herself in dire need of funds last year due to her father’s critical illness, her mother-in-law’s leukemia, and a financial crisis in her business. Desperate for money, on the eve of Lunar New Year on February 9, she took a train to Henan to retrieve her savings.
Upon arriving in Henan, Hu Weiming was intercepted by a group of people in black clothes and forcefully taken to a small dark room in the Zhengdong New District Public Security Bureau. She suffered a heart attack during her detention but was denied medical attention. Later, she was transferred to the Zhengzhou Third Detention Center where she endured inhumane treatment.
According to Hu Weiming, starting from February 15, she was forced by the guards to make statements every day from 2 p.m. to after 10 p.m., without allowing her basic needs like using the restroom, essentially subjecting her to interrogation and coercion. She was lied to, promised release upon making a statement.
During her time in detention, she was denied access to legal counsel, exacerbating her father’s deteriorating health condition, eventually leading to his passing on April 12, 2024. Despite her plea to see her father one last time, the Henan authorities used it as leverage to coerce her into making false statements, eventually leading to her arrest by the Zhengzhou Procuratorate in the Henan Pilot Free Trade Zone.
Hu Weiming expressed her resentment, accusing the Henan authorities of tarnishing her reputation, depriving her of basic human rights, and exploiting her vulnerability in wanting to see her dying father to manipulate her into signing a confession. Even after signing, she was not allowed to bid her final farewell to her father, causing profound grief and unrest.
Hu Weiming strongly condemned the collusion between law enforcement and judicial authorities in Henan, condemning their abuse of power and violation of legal procedures, turning the law into a tool to extort depositors’ funds and unjustly imprison them. She called for a thorough investigation into the Henan judiciary, urging for the return of depositors’ funds and restoration of their innocence and justice.
In a related incident that occurred in April 2022, four village banks in Henan, including Yuzhou Xinminsheng Village Bank, Shangcai Huimin Village Bank, Zhecheng Huanghuai Village Bank, and Kaifeng Xindongfang Village Bank, abruptly ceased online withdrawals and transfers, leaving approximately 400,000 depositors unable to access their funds, involving billions of Chinese yuan.
This event sparked numerous protests and rights protection movements among depositors. As revealed by the Chinese civil rights organization “People’s Livelihood Observation,” as of December 2024, deposits of local depositors in Henan province had been fully reimbursed, but approximately 2,000 depositors from other provinces had their funds illegally frozen, lacking avenues for justice and protection.
On November 26, 2023, depositors from other provinces, under strict surveillance, managed to stage a protest demanding their deposits in Nanyang, Henan, only to be arrested by the police and detained for varying periods ranging from seven to fourteen days following a 48-hour confinement by the Nanyang Xinye Public Security Bureau.
On December 31, 2023, depositors from village banks in Henan once again gathered in Zhengzhou to seek justice, only to be intercepted upon arrival at the East Railway Station and subsequently confined to the training center, Qionglong Mountain Villa, under the Henan Financial Supervision and Administration Bureau, leading to a hunger strike in protest.
In early December 2024, village bank depositors from all over the country initiated a movement demanding assistance from local police stations.
On the eve of Lunar New Year on February 9, 2024, three depositors – Shi Jianjian, Ouyang Yun, and Hu Weiming – went to Henan to reclaim their funds but were arrested by the local authorities on charges of “provocation and troublemaking,” detained in the Zhengzhou Third Detention Center, and secretly tried and sentenced at the end of last year, only to be released before the Lunar New Year this year.