"An Alleyway in Hell" - a report by Human Rights Watch

[clear eye]

November 12, 2009

Since 2003, large numbers of Chinese citizens have been held incommunicado for days or months in secret, unlawful detention facilities. These facilities, known informally as "black jails" 黑监狱 or "black houses" 黑房屋,(1) are created and used primarily by local and provincial officials to detain petitioners who come to Beijing and provincial capitals seeking redress for complaints that are not resolved at lower levels of government. Public security officials in Beijing and other cities have not intervened to close the jails and, in at least some instances, have directly assisted black jail operators. This report, drawing on dozens of face-to-face interviews with former detainees in Beijing and other cities, details what happens to individuals once inside. Detainees are often physically and psychologically abused. Many are deprived of food, sleep, and medical care, and they are subject to theft and extortion by their guards. They have no access to family members or to legal counsel or to courts. The makeshift jails are found in state-owned hostels, hotels, nursing homes, and mental hospitals, among other locations. Some Chinese researchers and civil society activists suggest that the number of individuals detained in black jails each year reaches into the thousands.

Read more at: http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2009/11/12/alleyway-hell