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Anhui

Fake kidnapping uncovered

A man, surnamed Liu, who faked his own kidnapping to get his wife to pay him a ransom of 100,000 yuan ($15,480) was recently placed in detention house for six days as punishment for disturbing public order in Chuzhou. Liu hatched the scam in a hotel room with a friend, surnamed Wu, after he lost money in the stock market. Liu fabricated a fake scene and sent photos to his wife in which he was bound to a chair by the cord of a desk lamp, a towel stuffed into his mouth, and somewhat bizarrely he was pantless. Liu's wife, however, called police and Liu's plan was uncovered by the hotel's surveillance footage.