Taihai.com, July 29th - (Haiyang Reporter Shen Hualing, Correspondent Xing Ting) A college student from another province was invited by an online friend to visit Xiamen. Instead of enjoying the trip, they came up with a plan to kidnap a night club "escort". Using the pretext of having a late-night snack, they lured the "escort" to a hotel apartment and then proceeded to carry out a kidnapping for ransom. Yesterday, Siming District Court held a trial for this case.
Ms. Zhang is a third-year student at a university in Hubei Province. She met Tian online and in January, at his invitation, she traveled to Xiamen for tourism where she also met Liu and others. Due to a lack of money, they hatched a plan to rob the belongings of a night club "hostess". On the evening of January 15th, Ms. Zhang first went to a nightclub in Xiamen for entertainment and then lured the "hostess," Ms. Yang, to a pre-rented hotel apartment under the pretense of having a late-night snack. Subsequently, Ms. Zhang and Liu threatened Ms. Yang with a fruit knife, bound her hands and feet, and stole her mobile phone and over 3000 yuan in cash. Not satisfied, the two then forced Ms. Yang to call her boyfriend, demanding that he gather 30,000 yuan as ransom under the guise of losing money while gambling.
However, upon receiving the call, Ms. Yang's boyfriend quietly reported the incident to the police. The next day at noon, Liu was caught on the spot by the police at the bus stop where the ransom exchange was supposed to take place. Meanwhile, Ms. Zhang, who had been guarding Ms. Yang until around 12:30 PM, became frightened when Liu did not return on time. She then released Ms. Yang and fled to Wuhan. On April 28th of this year, Ms. Zhang turned herself in to the local public security authorities.