RIVERDALE, Utah, Jan. 2, 2024 (Gephardt Daily) — A Chinese foreign exchange student and his parents have returned to Asia after he spent a torturous month in communication with cyber kidnappers who convinced him his family would be harmed unless he cooperated completely.
That was a news update from Riverdale Police Chief Casey Warren, who talked about the case Tuesday with reporters.
The 17-year-old exchange student had been living with a host family in Riverdale when he was confirmed to be missing on Thursday evening. He was found on Sunday, cold and hungry but safe, in a small tent in a remote and mountainous area near the mouth of Box Elder Canyon, near Brigham City.
According to Warren, cyber kidnappers had contacted the teen about a month ago, threatening to harm his family in China unless he provided money. The teen, ordered to share that information with no one, sent what money he could from his bank, in Ogden, and asked his parents for more.
“At some point, (the boy’s) family was questioning how much money they were sending to (him),” Warren said. “That’s where they (the cyber criminals) upped the ante, if you will.”
The cyber kidnappers, who were in China, Warren said, instructed the youth to take photos of himself “and isolate himself, and they began targeting the parents directly.”
The student purchased a small tent and began to look for Wasatch Front locations where he could camp and be isolated, in keeping with the instructions of the parties allegedly threatening his family.
The logic behind the isolation, Warren said, was “because they know there’s a high probability the police or law enforcement will be contacted. And once we contact him and we know he is safe, the game is up. The parents will know he is safe, and they won’t send any more money. So the reason why they have him seclude himself from the woods, or away from society, is so they can continue to extort as much money as possible.”
Once the boy was secluded, cyber kidnappers sent his parents ransom information, Warren said, and the boy’s parents contacted his school in Utah, who called police. The host family, who had heard the youth moving around in his basement bedroom early Thursday morning, had not realized he was missing, Warren said.
Riverdale police joined with agents from the FBI and multiple local law enforcement agencies, and the investigation began, full force, Warren said. It was the FBI, familiar with cyber kidnapping and extortion cases, that raised the possibility.
The boy’s phone, which had been turned off since his disappearance, ended up holding clues that would ultimately lead to his recovery. Investigators checked out locations where it had pinged cellphone towers in the days before it was turned off. Among the sites checked out were the boy’s bank in Ogden; Provo, where police who had encountered the boy earlier and were concerned about his camping gear and the frigid temperatures, had questioned the youth, who did not mention the cyber threats to his family; and Brigham City.
So Riverdale police contacted the Weber County Sheriff Search and Rescue drone team, Warren said. They feared the freezing, overnight temperatures could threaten the missing boy’s life.
“They responded out there and searched with the drone with the thermal-imaging cameras throughout the night. It was a really large geographic area that we were searching,” he said. “We didn’t have any luck that evening. We responded back the following day, which would have been on the 31st.”
On Sunday, the drone team resumed the search, and a Department of Public Safety helicopter also was deployed, Warren said. In addition, searchers including Riverdale Police Sgt. Enstrom were on the ground.
Engstrom was searching up the canyon, along a riverbank, and “there was a creek down there you wouldn’t know was there,” Warren said. “He noticed a place that you could cross the creek and decided to go hiking up the mountain. Sgt. Engstrom, with some good police work and getting the boots on the ground, was able to locate (the missing boy) in his tent.”
The boy, who had no heater and few supplies, was relieved to see the officer, Warren said in an earlier statement. The student requested a warm cheeseburger and a phone call to his parents. On Thursday, they had paid the cyber kidnappers a ransom of about $80,000 and contacted the boy’s school, according to an earlier news release.
Warren said the boy followed the cyber kidnappers’ instructions and kept the secret because he believed his family would be harmed if he did not. It’s a common scam targeting families of foreign exchange students, who are living outside their cultures, and who are unfamiliar with cultural norms where they are staying.
Cyber crimes usually target people deemed to be trusting, Warren said. Kidnapping scams are basically similar to romance scams, in which criminals contact teens and adults, gain trust and request intimate photos, then threaten to share the private photos to the victim’s friends, family and employers unless money is provided.
“We have these types of things all the time,” Warren said. “This cyber kidnapping targeted a foreign exchange thing, but the (romance) one I just described happens weekly here in Weber County.
“So my message to people is if you are being extorted and someone has threatened you and is telling you to send the money or else for whatever circumstances, your best thing to do is, first of all, cease contact, don’t send money, and contact your local law enforcement officials.”
