© FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images The Chinese national flag is raised in front of the Shanghai No.1 Intermediate People’s Court in Shanghai. FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images
- A 65-year-old man has been charged with extortion after kidnapping his granddaughter for ransom.
- He sought $72,000 from his daughter and son-in-law to pay off his gambling debt, per local media reports.
- The man, known only as Yuan, argued that the kidnapping should only be considered a family dispute.
A Shanghai man was sentenced to prison for kidnapping his own granddaughter so he could maintain his gambling addiction with the ransom money.
The kidnapping, — orchestrated by a 65-year-old man identified only by his surname, Yuan — was first reported by the Shanghai Law and Rule Journal. The legal news outlet didn’t specify when the incident occurred but wrote on April 18 that Yuan had just started serving his prison sentence.
Yuan kicked off his plan by picking up his four-year-old granddaughter from her kindergarten and taking her out to eat and shop without her mother’s knowledge, the Journal reported.
The girl’s mother then arrived at the school and realized her daughter was missing. She received a message from Yuan demanding $72,000, according to the Journal.
“Take out 500,000 yuan in three days, or you’ll never see your precious daughter again!” Yuan told his daughter, per the Journal.
She called Yuan to persuade him to give up on the plot but failed to sway him, the outlet reported.
Yuan was arrested that evening after his daughter reported him to the police, and he was charged with extortion and sent to the Xinshou Prison, a facility in Shanghai, per the Journal.
He protested the charges in court, saying the kidnapping should be considered a family dispute and not a crime, per the Journal. Chinese courts can designate some crimes within families — including domestic violence — as family affairs.
The Journal did not specify the length of Yuan’s sentence, but cited police reports saying that he pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Yuan was desperate for the ransom money because he’d run up a heavy gambling debt and was diagnosed with stomach cancer, the Journal reported. His wife divorced him, and he began neglecting his business because of his gambling habits, according to the outlet.
While serving his sentence, Yuan went on a hunger strike and had difficulty getting along with other prisoners, the Journal reported.
“I’m 65 years old, and my daughter still comes after me. She doesn’t want me to improve, she just wants me to die!” he kept saying to authorities, the Journal wrote.
But he stopped resisting after his daughter and ex-wife contacted him in prison, and the Journal reported that he has since cooperated with prison authorities.
The account of Yuan’s kidnapping has since been shared on social media by police departments, a municipal court, and public prosecutor’s offices across China.
Several major Chinese news outlets, such as the state-owned daily The Paper, have also carried the story.
People on Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, and Weibo, the Chinese version of Twitter, reacted in horror to the news of Yuan’s actions.
“I’d cut off contact with him. No idea what he’d do after he gets out of prison,” wrote one Weibo user.