Missing foreign exchange student found safe inside tent in Utah in ‘cyber kidnapping’: Police

A lacking international alternate scholar from China was discovered secure inside a tent on a Utah mountainside following a dayslong search in what police known as a case of “cyber kidnapping.”

Kai Zhuang, 17, was reported lacking Thursday evening by his highschool, based on the Riverdale Police Division. The teenager’s mother and father advised faculty officers that they obtained {a photograph} of Zhuang from his alleged kidnappers indicating he had been kidnapped, police stated.

His household advised police they’d transferred ransom cash to financial institution accounts in China “attributable to steady threats from the abductors,” the Riverdale Police Division stated. Additionally they supplied the {photograph}, which appeared to indicate Zhuang being held captive and in peril, police stated.

The teenager’s host household was not conscious he was lacking and there have been no indicators that he was forcefully taken from his Riverdale house, police stated. The household heard him on the house early Thursday, police stated.

Riverdale police stated they labored with the FBI, U.S. Embassy in China and Chinese language officers to attempt to find him in what they suspected to be a cyber kidnapping. Perpetrators of this crime have a tendency to focus on international alternate college students and inform their victims to isolate themselves and make themselves look like held captive in an try and extort the victims’ household for ransom, police stated.

Investigators realized Zhuang had bought tenting gear and tried to go tenting in Provo, about 75 miles south of Riverdale, on Dec. 20, however native police have been involved for his security and organized transportation to return him to his host household, Riverdale police stated.

The sufferer didn’t speak in confidence to police or his host mother and father on the time that cyber kidnappers have been controlling him, Riverdale police stated.

Investigators believed Zhuang was now isolating himself on the course of the cyber kidnappers in a tent within the Brigham Metropolis canyon space, about 27 miles north of Riverdale, amid dangerously chilly temperatures, police stated.

The Weber County Sheriff’s Workplace Search and Rescue Drone staff and Brigham Metropolis police assisted in looking out a big space alongside the Wasatch entrance in Brigham Metropolis for the teenager. A Riverdale police detective who hiked the mountainside on foot got here throughout the teenager “alive however very chilly and scared” contained in the tent in a wooded space on Sunday, police stated.

“The sufferer was relieved to see police,” Riverdale police stated. “The sufferer had no warmth supply contained in the tent, solely a warmth blanket, a sleeping bag, restricted meals and water and several other telephones that have been presumed for use to hold out the cyber kidnapping.”

First responders cleared the teenager of any main medical considerations on the scene.

“The sufferer solely needed to talk to his household to make sure they have been secure and requested a heat cheeseburger, each of which have been completed on the way in which again to Riverdale PD,” police stated.

The investigation is ongoing.

Riverdale police urged anybody who has turn into the goal of cyber kidnapping to discontinue contact with the suspects and never ship them cash, and to contact their native police division instantly.

“I need international alternate college students to know they’ll belief police to guard them and to work with police to make sure their security in addition to their household’s security overseas,” Riverdale Chief Casey Warren stated in a press release.