More than 300 people were detained after some attacked police in
northern China during a raid on a pyramid-selling scam, injuring
the top local police officer and destroying two police vans.
The attack happened about 5 PM on Sunday when policemen in
Handan County, Hebei Province, launched a blitz in Hanba
Village after a man reported his laptop and cell phone were stolen
in the village, the Yanzhao Evening News reported today. He
was reportedly lured to Hanba by members of the pyramid-selling
group.
Eight policemen drove two vehicles to Hanba, but were stopped by
hundreds of people waiting at the village gate, according to one of
the policeman quoted in the report. He added that most were young
men from outside the village.
"I could tell they were coming after us from their facial
expressions and some of them were carrying wooden sticks or
stones," the policeman told the newspaper.
The policemen called 110 for backup and decided to retreat. The
mob followed the officers back to the police station.
At least 90 young men besieged the station, shouting and
clapping hands while another group did the same on a nearby street,
the report said, adding that those people were identified as
members of some pyramid scam groups.
As more policemen returned to the station to control the scene,
the mob became irritated. They threw bricks and tiles at the police
station. The head of Handan's police bureau was hit in the face by
a brick.
The confusion lasted about 20 minutes, the report said.
Some villagers in Hanba told the newspaper that the attack was
both revenge and a warning to policemen over constant raids in the
area that is plagued by many illegal pyramid scheme groups.
In response, police in Handan launched an all-night raid in
cooperation with the industry and commerce supervision departments
on Sunday.
They have detained more than 300 who were allegedly involved in
the attack and illegal pyramid sales by early morning yesterday,
the report said. Two reported senior leaders of pyramid scheme
gangs were also detained.
About 200 people were repatriated to their home towns while the
rest are now under investigation.
Hanba is regarded as "heaven for pyramid scam groups" for its
convenient traffic networks, the report said.
Regular raids in the area were said to have failed to stop the
illegal business as people involved in the sales outnumbered
residents, the report said.
China launched a month-long campaign against pyramid schemes
from July 16 after violent confrontations between illegal sales
rings and law-enforcement officers.
Meanwhile, public security authorities together with other
government agencies busted more than 17,000 illegal pyramid schemes
worth 10 billion yuan. About 16,000 suspects involved were caught,
Wu Heping, spokesman for the Ministry of Public Security, said
today in Beijing.
Murders and robberies sparked by pyramid schemes hit more than
100 last year, which severely disturbed market order and public
security and also endangered the social stability, Wu said.
Several government officers, including a deputy director of a
local Industry and Commerce Administration, were seriously injured
after they were assaulted by more than 140 members of a pyramid
ring during a raid in Siping City, Jilin Province, on June 19.
China banned pyramid selling in 1998. Authorities said such
schemes had become synonymous with cheating and fraud.
(Shanghai Daily August 14, 2007)