A Chinese man was being quizzed by cops Thursday for allegedly keeping six women locked up inside a grim, makeshift dungeon for two years while he used them as sex slaves.
Li Hao, 34, is accused of killing two of his captives and subjecting the others to horrifying sexual and emotional abuse. Continue reading after the jump.
His alleged crimes emerged this month when cops raided a residential building in central China’s Henan Province and located four victims cowering inside a fortified underground cellar.
The remains of two more dead victims were found buried beneath the dank, squalid pen, which was divided into two dingy, foul-smelling rooms, accessible only by a narrow tunnel and sealed with heavy iron doors.
Detectives believe Li, a married father-of-one, spent more than a year digging it out beneath a storeroom he had rented out.
Once his subterranean prison was complete, Li trawled karaoke bars in Henan’s Luoyang City to seduce young girls and lure them into captivity, Shanghai Daily said.
Such was his hold on his six victims, cops said, he was quickly able to make them “fall in love with him.”
Li kept them imprisoned for as long as two years — feeding them once every two days and living with them for 15 days a month while his wife presumed he was working as a security guard.
Despite their pitiful living conditions, they referred to him as “hubby” and “big brother” — and even squabbled over whose turn it was to have sex with him, sickened detectives revealed.
Li allegedly beat one woman to death in front of her terrified fellow inmates to teach them “to be obedient,” before burying her body close to where they slept, Shanghai Daily said.
Another was allegedly murdered when she fought over whose turn it was to sleep with Li, the paper added, citing a report in the Southern Metropolis Daily.
Li was arrested this month after he released one of the remaining “slaves” to work as a prostitute but she tipped off cops.
When the freed victim led officers to the underground lair, the three women still locked inside are said to have wept and cried out, “You finally come home, big brother.”
Inside, police found computers Li had apparently hooked up to keep his captives occupied with video games but without internet access.
One of the four survivors, nicknamed Keke, was arrested for allegedly taking part in one of the murders. Li’s wife has denied any knowledge of his horrifying activities, reports said.
The chilling case echoes the abduction of American Jaycee Lee Dugard, who was kidnapped by a couple and held captive for 18 years.
It also recalls the gruesome crimes of Austrian cellar beast Josef Fritzl, who kept his own daughter imprisoned for almost a quarter of a century, during which she bore him seven children.