A life lost for a few bars of chocolates

A 12-year-old girl, who was detained by a convenience store's managers in Yongchang county of Northwest China's Gansu province for allegedly stealing some chocolate bars, committed suicide by jumping from a high-rise building. While stealing is an offense, the tragedy that led to mass protests in Yongchang last week should prompt a rethink on the practice of shop-owners detaining alleged thieves and demanding high fines.

Although media reports give different details of the Yongchang incident, they all say the girl was detained by the store managers for some time. We do not know whether she was subjected to other forms of humiliation as well.

Over the years, many media reports have described how store and supermarket managers demand fines of up to 10 times the value of the stolen goods - a standard that all supermarket and store managers across the country seem to follow. If the "thieves" cannot pay the amount, they are generally detained by the stores' security guards. But in most cases, the alleged thieves pay some money - often not as high as 10 times the value of the stolen goods - to settle the dispute without the involvement of police.