Cult leader gets 4-year prison term

Cao Yinhua, 48, a regional leader of the illegal cult Quannengshen (almighty god), stands trial at the district people's court of Wuchang, Wuhan City, July 1, 2014. Cao was sentenced to four years in jail, according to the ruling of the court. (Xinhua/Xiao Yijiu)

A cult leader was sentenced to four years in jail in central China's Hubei Province yesterday.

Cao Yinhua, 48, a regional leader of the illegal cult Quannengshen was found guilty of establishing grassroots cult organizations, recruiting believers and producing preaching articles in Hubei and Hunan provinces, according to the ruling of the district people's court of Wuchang, Wuhan City.

Cao was held by police in October 2013. Twenty books, 53 pamphlets, 49 discs and six computers that included Quannengshen material were found in her possession and at places where her group gathered, the court heard.

Cao joined the cult in February 2007. She received laojiao — re-education through labor — punishment for 18 months in 2009. She became the cult's leader in Hubei and Hunan in early 2013, according to the court.

Twenty-five cult members were given jail terms from three and a half years to eight years in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region last Thursday.

The cult came into the spotlight when six Quannengshen members beat a woman to death on May 28 at a McDonalds outlet in Zhaoyuan City in the eastern province of Shandong, after she refused to give them her telephone number.

Appearing in the 1990s in central China's Henan Province, the Quannengshen group claims that Jesus has been resurrected as Yang Xiangbin, wife of the sect's founder Zhao Weishan, also known as Xu Wenshan. The couple fled to the United States in September 2000.

The sect has been widely criticized for spreading rumors and coercing people to join.