A woman who was found locked in a shack, chained, caused outrage China over the practice of human trafficking was sold to two “husbands”, authorities said.
The mother of eight, identified only as Xiaohuamei (The Little Plum Blossom), was found in a wooden shack on the outskirts of Xuzhou City in Jiangsu Province last month, wearing thin clothes in the middle of winter and a metal neck brace.
The shocking video of her discovery has been viewed billions of times a day on the Chinese Internet, even rivaling the attention paid to Beijing winter Olympics.
As a result, the issue of trafficking in women as brides has been highlighted in China after authorities initially dismissed their concerns before desperately trying to censor critical online comments about their failure to protect her.
Officials announced Wednesday that they have arrested her husband – identified by his last name Dong – accused of keeping his wife tied up in a shack.
At least 17 employees of the local Communist Party have also been punished, and five others have been arrested, in addition to their husbands.
The mother of eight, identified only as Xiaohuamei (The Little Plum Blossom), was found in a wooden hut on the outskirts of Xuzhou City in Jiangsu Province last month.
Provincial authorities said the woman – now 44 – was found to have schizophrenia and was sold several times, including once in 1998 for 5,000 yuan (£ 580) after being taken from her village to the southwestern province of Yunnan.
Xiaohuamei was born in 1977 and married for the first time in 1995. She divorced in 1997 and returned to the village of Yagu in Yunnan.
A year later, a woman named Sang took her from Yagu to the coastal province of Jiangsu, about 1,200 miles away, under the guise of receiving medical care and finding a husband.
But Sang then sold it to a man in Donghai County for 5,000 yuan ($ 790), Jiangsu authorities said.
They said Sang and her husband were jailed in 2000 for trafficking girls, one for five years and the other for seven.
Both were arrested on Tuesday.
After only a few months with the man in Donghai County, Xiaohuamei disappeared one morning. She ended up in Feng County, where the video was taken, showing her tied up in chains as a result of further traffic, according to the official’s report.
The shocking video of the discovery of Little Plum Blossom has been watched billions of times a day on the Chinese Internet, even rivaling the attention paid to the Beijing Winter Olympics
According to the report, a couple running a hotel in the neighboring province of Henan found the woman wandering like a beggar and accepted her.
A month later, they sold it to a construction foreman, who then sold it to a man in Feng County.
This man then sold her to Mr. Dong’s family, whom she would marry and eventually have eight children. Investigators said this chain of events is still under investigation.
The husband was formally arrested on Tuesday along with two other people accused of trafficking, authorities said, and investigations are ongoing against six others allegedly involved in her trafficking.
Officials said “special action is being taken to fully and thoroughly investigate and correct the violation”.
The case continued to spark anger on Wednesday, with a related hashtag on China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform garnering 580 million views shortly after the news of the sanctions came.
“Confidence in our government has long been lost,” one user said in a statement. “You didn’t show us evidence.”
Others called for national repression against trafficking.
Officials announced Wednesday that they have arrested her husband – identified by his last name Dong – accused of keeping his wife tied up in a shack. At least 17 local officials were also punished and others arrested
China’s one-child policy – weakened only in 2016 – has led to a shortage of women due to the traditional preference for boys.
The resulting gender imbalance is thought to have fueled human trafficking, according to a report by the United States Congress.
The footage was first posted on Chinese social media sites by an online blogger days before the recent Lunar New Year celebration, which the woman found while visiting the area to promote charitable efforts in the country’s rural areas.
This has led to questions about the treatment of women and the failure to curb alleged abuses, and after local officials responded with a series of inconsistent statements, the Chinese public has only become angry, demanding responsibility.
One woman said on social media that she tried to visit her mother but was stopped by police and said she had been sent to hospital.
Some called for a boycott of Fengxian products, while others signaled support, reading: “The world has not abandoned you. Your sisters are coming.
The activism has raised concerns in the totalitarian country that it could escalate into a Chinese #MeToo case, which authorities previously suppressed.
Trafficking in brides is a major problem in China after decades of family planning have led to a shortage of boys.
Under Chinese law, buying a victim of trafficking results in a sentence of less than three years in prison.