Police officers in northeastern China’s Dandong city arrested a 41-year-old woman surnamed Hao last week after she attempted to drive her elderly father to a hospital to retrieve medicine during a local Chinese coronavirus lockdown, the Global Times reported over the weekend, noting that the woman’s father attempted to slap one of the police officers after the officer shoved Hao to the ground.
Hao was reportedly driving her father, 70, to a nearby hospital to obtain medicine for his health condition on June 21 when the duo was stopped at a government-run checkpoint. Police officers asked Hao and her father for state-issued health codes required for travel during anti-epidemic lockdowns in China. When Hao failed to produce a “green” health code on her government-run smartphone app, the police officers refused to allow her to continue driving through the checkpoint. Hao said she had received special permission from local government officials to drive her father to a hospital, but the police officers refused to accept her explanation.
“[A]fter Hao stepped out of the car and argued with the police, her father slapped an officer on the face,” according to a statement issued by the public security bureau of Dandong’s Zhenxing district on June 22.
“Hao was sentenced to 10 days in detention and her father was subjected to mandatory measures,” the statement read, without elaborating.
Various video clips of the incident filmed by either the police officers involved or eyewitnesses have circulated online in recent days. One such video “showed that after failing to convince the police to let them pass, Hao tried to get back to the car to leave but the police officer blocked the door and did not allow her to leave,” China’s state-run Global Times reported on June 24.
“The police officer pushed Hao who fell on the ground during [the] argument,” the newspaper detailed.
While Zhenxing district’s public security bureau claimed that Hao’s elderly father “slapped an officer on the face,” a video report by the news outlet China Revealed on June 25 suggested Hao’s father failed to make physical contact with the police officer.
“According to a video posted by a passerby, the father’s hand did not seem to touch the head of the policeman,” the news outlet relayed after reviewing the video clip, which it republished via its YouTube channel.
“Still, immediately, the policeman fell to the ground, rubbed his head with his hand, and did not forget to turn around and ask his colleague standing behind, ‘Have you recorded the incident?'” China Revealed continued.
“After receiving the answer, ‘Yes,’ the officer immediately stood up and took restraining measures against the woman,” according to the news outlet’s analysis.
CNN quoted Dandong police as saying they “issued Hao a 10-day administrative detention for obstructing their work, while her father had received a ‘criminal compulsory measure’ – that could result in further charges […] on suspicion of assaulting a police officer.”
Dandong police claimed that Hao and her father “broke through checkpoints” and were stopped “according to the law,” adding that Hao had “refused to cooperate and abide by the epidemic prevention regulations.”
Dandong is located along China’s border with North Korea. The city’s government began restricting train access out of the region in March before locking down the entire community of 2.18 million in April to contain an ongoing Chinese coronavirus epidemic.