The kidnapper’s plot to ‘die and come back to life’

Vuong Vu Tuong, 51 years old, is a famous feng shui master in Thang Phuong town, Ba Chau city, Hebei province. Anyone in town who wants to build a house, buy a house, or read fortune telling comes to Tuong. This job helped his family build a new house, buy a car and save a lot of money.

On January 7, 2012, Mr. Tuong was invited to visit his house to see feng shui. After his afternoon nap, he took the compass and walked out of the house. Mrs. Quach Tu Phuong, Mr. Tuong’s wife, waited until evening, but still did not see her husband back, nor did she see her phone call. But she thought everyone in town knew each other, nothing dangerous, guess where he got drunk.

However, the next day, Mr. Tuong still had no word, Phuong began to panic and asked his relatives to find him.

On the third day, Mr. Tuong disappeared, Phuong received a strange call. The other party used a voice changer device, emitting a hoarse, timid voice, saying that Mr. Tuong was kidnapped, and if he wanted him back, he had to pay 200,000 yuan within two days, or else he would have to receive the body. The frightened Mrs. Phuong quickly agreed. After hanging up the phone, she informed the police.

An investigation team was sent to the town to look for Mr. Tuong’s whereabouts. After checking 20 surveillance cameras on the street, the police only determined that he left the house at 4 pm.

Phuong said that her husband has a habit of making notes with guests on the white plexiglass board in the bedroom so as not to forget. But when checking the board, from the 1st to the 6th there is a schedule, until the 7th of January it is empty.

The call on January 10 was just over ten seconds long, and the other party used a voice changer device, making it difficult for the police to get a clue. Fortunately, Mrs. Phuong was afraid of missing important information when answering the phone, so she pressed the record button. The police took the recording and managed to recover the kidnapper’s voice. However, his voice is very strange, the accent is like other locals, no one can recognize her and her family.

Because the kidnapper did not notify the time and place of the transaction on the first call, the police determined that he would definitely call back. But after two days of waiting, without seeing them contact, everyone felt scared, worried that Tuong was harmed.

While conducting a house-to-house search while waiting for the kidnapper’s phone call, the police received word that a body had been found in a wasteland not far from town. The face of the corpse was severely damaged, it was impossible to determine if it was Tuong or not.

After the forensic doctor collected the victim’s DNA, Tuong’s wife and children were also called in for identification. Based on clothes, birthmarks on the body and other signs, relatives confirmed this is Tuong’s body.

But unexpectedly, just one day after Tuong’s death was confirmed, Mrs. Phuong’s phone rang again. The other party still used a voice changer, said Tuong was not dead and asked the family to quickly prepare 200,000 yuan ransom.

On the other end of the line, Tuong’s urgent voice sounded: “Quickly prepare a ransom to save me!”.

The results of the forensic examination are not yet available, but Mr. Tuong’s family is 100% sure that the body is Tuong, so is the victim still alive or dead in the end?

The police carefully analyzed the second call recording and found new clues. After restoring the kidnapper’s voice, they discovered that when the kidnapper talked to Phuong, the surroundings were very noisy. But when Mr. Tuong spoke, the space seemed very empty, with a little echo. The police had to resort to professional technology to determine if Tuong’s voice on the phone was pre-recorded or not.

In the meantime, the family also quickly collected the ransom.

At noon on January 14, Phuong received a call from the kidnapper again. At this time, he specified the time and place of the transaction, asked her to take a taxi alone to go there, the ransom should be wrapped carefully in black plastic bags, placed next to the garbage pile next to the chicken farm 5 km away in the suburbs.

To ensure Phuong’s safety, the police disguised themselves as the taxi driver accompanying her, telling her to ask to speak to her husband when the kidnapper called. But he said Tuong is not around, then ended the transaction.

Not long after, the police received information that someone had seen Mr. Tuong appear near the house in the evening. Three witnesses are father and son who open a barbecue shop near Tuong’s house, the other is the owner of a nail shop next door. They described Mr. Tuong wearing a black coat, holding a compass, and walking with a slight limp as usual. When he passed by, he also waved to father and son from a distance. But he did not return home but disappeared into the night.

When everyone was doubting and confused, after 7 days of waiting, the autopsy results showed that the body in the landfill was Mr. Tuong, the voice in the phone was recorded. Police believe that the kidnapper deliberately disguised himself as a victim to make people think he was still alive and continued to scam for ransom.

The kidnapper must know Tuong’s living habits. The victim always wrote a schedule on the board every day, but did not write it on the date of disappearance, and walked out of the house that day, indicating that the destination was so close and familiar that it did not need to be written on the board. Therefore, the place where Mr. Tuong was kidnapped must be near his house. Since the kidnapper tried his best to make people think that the victim wasn’t dead, he certainly hadn’t left, waiting for the next transaction.

Combined with the clues that were echoes in the recording of Tuong’s voice, the police began to secretly search unfinished buildings, factories, abandoned warehouses and basements within a kilometer of the victim’s house. . They discovered an old basement, uninhabited for many years, nearby a factory, very noisy during the day and deserted at night.

The basement was huge, the ground covered with dust and cobwebs, but there was one corner of the wall that was much cleaner than the others, and there was a faint blood stain on the corner.

Police immediately sealed off the scene, took blood samples for comparison, the results were blood stains belonging to Tuong and also the owner of the basement, Ly Hong Lo, 42 years old.

People said that Lo went to the city to work as a hired worker and usually only returned home during the Lunar New Year. But recently they were surprised that he had returned on New Year’s Eve.

The police immediately arrested Lo. During the interrogation, Lo confessed to the crime.

Lo works in the business of buying and selling gold to make a profit, owes a lot of money. Due to debt, Lo was forced to flee to his hometown. He saw Tuong driving a car, so he decided to kidnap for ransom.

Revealed as an excuse to renovate the basement to invite Tuong out. When Tuong arrived, he beat the victim with bricks. During the ransom process, Lo asked Tuong to pre-record the call for help. He was afraid that after demanding the ransom, Tuong realized he should kill the victim. Lo did not expect the police to discover the body so quickly, so they planned to fake it.

On July 28, 2012, Lo was sentenced to death for the crime of Kidnap and Killing.

Tue Anh (According to CCTV)