Kidnapper caught while boy hostage wriggles free

A gambler kidnapped a 10-year-old boy and hoped to use the ransom to recover his losses, but he fell into a police trap while his hostage, tied up in a small woods, managed to break free. Wu Liqing, a 26-year-old native of Jiangxi Province, has been arrested on charges of kidnapping, Minhang District prosecutors said today. Wu came to Shanghai last December and was hired by a manufacturing company as sales manager with a monthly salary of 5,000 yuan (US$762). Because his wife and daughter weren't with him, Wu grew addicted to game parlor slot machines and soon lost 200,000 yuan. To make things worse, he got fired for spending too much time in the game parlor. Wu decided to go back home. On his way to the train station on January 26, Wu saw a boy walking alone after school and a ransom plot came to his mind. When the boy entered a residential complex, Wu, who didn't know the boy at all, called him "Little Xu" at random. To his surprise, the boy responded and asked how he knew his name, prosecutors said. Wu lied that he knew him because his nephew lived here. He asked the boy to guide him to buy a toy for his nephew. The innocent boy followed him out of the complex. Wu took the boy into a small woods and called the boy's mother to demand 150,000 yuan. The woman reported to police immediately and tried to negotiate with Wu under police instruction. Wu tied the boy to a tree, covered his mouth with his gloves and gauze mask, then left to look for a place to take the money. He saw a flower bed near a hotel on Chunshen Road and called the boy's mother to put money in the flower bed, the prosecutors said. When Wu arrived to pick the money on the early morning of January 27, he was ambushed by police. When police hurried to the woods, they only saw ropes on the ground. At that time, the boy called his mother, saying he had managed to escape and was in a snack store.