Yang Xuegui (杨学贵) is a former hospital worker and army veteran from Lanzhou, Gansu Province, currently serving a six-year prison sentence in connection with his practice of Falun Gong.
Born in 1965, Yang is a native of Lanzhou. He joined the People's Liberation Army in 1982 and served as a signal-corps soldier, including deployment to the Laoshan frontline during the 1985 border conflict. After leaving the army, he was assigned to work at Lanzhou No. 2 People's Hospital, where he served on the general-services staff. He began practicing Falun Gong in 1996.
According to records compiled by the prisoner-of-conscience database of Chinese Human Rights Defenders, Yang has been detained repeatedly for his beliefs. He was first detained and sentenced in 2002 to eight years in prison, and again in 2016 to five years, both in connection with practicing Falun Gong. The database records that he was subjected to torture while in custody.
On January 16, 2024, Yang was reported to police while speaking to people on the street about Falun Gong. On March 4, 2024, officers of the Anning Branch of the Lanzhou Public Security Bureau took him into custody and searched his home. He was placed under criminal detention, then formally arrested and indicted.
On December 28, 2024, the Chengguan District Court of Lanzhou sentenced Yang to six years in prison and a fine of 5,000 yuan. The specific charges of record are not publicly documented. He is held at the Lanzhou No. 3 Detention Center, with his sentence running to March 4, 2030.
Yang's case is also documented in the victim archive of Minghui, a Falun Gong-affiliated media outlet, and he is listed among the prisoners of conscience held in mainland China in the August 2026 monthly roster published by the Rights Defense Network (维权网).
Do-not-merge note: 杨学贵 (Yang Xuegui — this person) is a different person from 杨学华 (Yáng Xuéhuá, adjacent roster entry), 杨雪盈 (Yang Xueying), and unrelated legal/business/criminal records under a similar name; the variant characters 杨雪贵 do not exist in the prisoner database (zero-collision verified).
Media profile and archive: Yang Xuegui (杨学贵) — Media Profile & Archive