A Chinese woman had no idea her husband was a famous critic of China's government until police stormed into their apartment and dragged him out

• A Chinese woman believes her imprisoned husband, Ruan Xiaohuan, is the legendary dissident blogger behind ProgramThink.
• She told The New York Times that she had no idea about her husband until police dragged him away.

A Chinese woman had no idea her husband was a legendary dissident who railed against China's government online until police stormed into their apartment and dragged him away.

Bei Zhenying told The New York Times that when her husband, Ruan Xiaohuan, answered the door to their Shanghai apartment on May 10, 2021, a crowd of police officers flooded in and pulled her husband out.

At the time, Bei had no idea what was going on as Chinese police spent 12 hours ransacking her apartment, according to the Times. All the officers would say, she told the Times, was that her husband had subverted state power, a crime that can lead to years in prison.

Bei didn't see or speak to her husband for nearly two years until she was allowed to attend his sentencing, the Times reported.

At the hearing, Bei saw for the first time how poorly the government had treated her husband, who was sentenced to seven years in prison, the Times reported.

Bei now believes that her husband, a computer programmer who had always been secretive, was actually the man behind ProgramThink, a legendary blog that had been fiercely critical of the Chinese government for 12 years.

The website's anonymous author used the platform to expose the true wealth of the country's top leaders, to share the truth about events like the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre, and encourage readers to dissent.

And the same month that Bei's husband was taken away, the blog went dark, the Times reported.

Bei has never been able to prove that Ruan was the mastermind behind ProgramThink, but she told the Times that the blogger's writing, recommendations, and even the timeline match up exactly with her husband.

Bei spent months trying to fight her husband's conviction — garnering support from ProgramThink fans, hiring lawyers, and posting on Twitter — until she herself went silent in June, the Times reported.

A lawyer for Bei told the Times she is safe but could no longer comment.