Thailand’s Central Investigation Bureau police have rescued a 42-year-old Chinese woman being held captive by a call center gang in Bangkok. The group allegedly defrauded her of roughly Bt8 million and was trying to extort another Bt12.5 million from her parents.

Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop Bhuridej, the CIB commissioner, told reporters that the Chinese Embassy in Bangkok contacted them to help locate Ms. Song Xi-hua, 42 after her parents contacted the embassy after receiving the ransom demand.

Ms. Li Jianshe told CIB police that she received a WeChat message informing her that her daughter was being held captive in Thailand and that she needed to pay a ransom of Bt12.5 million for her release.

Additionally, the group sent her a video clip in which her daughter was seen holding a passport and declaring in Mandarin that she was in Thailand and was not forced to send the video.

Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop said the CIB opened an investigation right away after examining the CCTV footage from Suvarnabhumi airport. They found that Ms Song Xi-hua had arrived in Thailand on August 15 from Germany.

Subsequent inquiries revealed that the 42-year-old Chinese woman was residing at a hostel on Soi Kingkaew in Samut Prakan’s Bang Phli area in Bangkok. Police then contacted the hostel owner, who said she had seldom left her room. She was in her room when police arrived at the hostel.

At first, the woman insisted that she was okay and knew nothing about ransom. However, she told the truth after meeting with her parents, who had traveled to Bangkok from China.

She told police that while employed in Germany, she was tricked into traveling to Thailand by a Chinese call center gang. She said she received a call from a man, who claimed to be a police officer from China, informing her that she was wanted on charges of human trafficking.

He told her that if she wanted the charges dropped, she would have to pay him a bribe, which she agreed to pay 200,000 euros, approximately Bt8 million. She was then informed that she needed to go to Bangkok to meet with a man who could assist her in resolving the matter.

When she went to meet the man in Bangkok, she was kidnapped by the call center gang members who made her set up Skype and video call features and put her in a hostel so they could keep an eye on her at all times.

She said they had moved her eight times to different locations during her 40 days in captivity and that she had also been warned not to speak with anyone in the hostel or contact the police.

Source: MCOT