Word: kidnaper
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Kidnapping for ransom is Bihar's biggest and, these days, only industry. Between 1992 and 2001, the last year for which figures are available, local police recorded 24,338 cases of kidnapping in the state, an average of more than six a day. Officers admit the real figure may be 10 times higher than that: kidnappers typically threaten to return if the victims go to the authorities. Police say Bihar has more than 100 kidnap gangs, and they don't prey solely on the rich or famous. In Salahuddin's district of Champaran, the center of Bihar's bandit country...
...Adding to the sense that Bihar is perilously out of control is the fact that even some politicians may be getting in on the kidnap game. Superintendent Shoba Ohatker, who has busted more kidnap gangs than any other officer, says that in her three years on the job, she has arrested suspected kidnappers hiding in the homes of local politicians four times. And she adds that her inquiry into a doctor's abduction last December led her to arrest and charge one assembly member with "15-20 cases of arms smuggling, kidnapping and murder." (His case has not yet come...
Gracia and Martin Burnham were working as missionaries in the Philippines when they were abducted in May 2001 by the terror and kidnap gang known as Abu Sayyaf. More than a year later, Philippine soldiers swooped in to save them, but Martin and another hostage, Ediborah Yap, were fatally shot during the ensuing firefight. Now home in Kansas, Gracia has found herself in the cross fire again over her memoir, In the Presence of My Enemies. Even before the book was released in the Philippines, reports emerged that Burnham charges a Philippine soldier with firing the shot that killed...
Most important, it's essential that kidnap victims and the people around them realize that recovery may never be truly complete. Years after an abduction, children and adults report that certain places or images may call up traumatic memories of the event, signs of a deep emotional shift that never wholly resolves itself. "It doesn't mean you can't go on," says Fassler, "but there are scars." The Smart family was still basking in the joy of their reunion last week. There will be time enough to tend to their wounds. --By Jeffrey Kluger
Kathleen Baty calls herself the Safety Chick. She has made it her mission to get women to think smart about keeping safe. Baty found her calling after being stalked for eight years by a former acquaintance who eventually attempted to kidnap her at knifepoint. After an 11-hour police standoff, Baty escaped. She was determined never to be a victim again. Her book A Girl's Gotta Do What a Girl's Gotta Do (Rodale) offers plans for staying safe while working, shopping, traveling, surfing the Net or going on a date. To avoid being dosed with a date-rape...