Scammed Tokyoites

[den4]

You would think that they'd at least call their kid with the ever present cell phones (or keitai) to see if this is really happening....or at least the school....


Scam targets Tokyo families

Tokyo, Japan, Nov. 10 (UPI) -- Japanese authorities have registered some 330 cases of a scam in which Tokyo families are asked to pay ransom for a fictitiously abducted child.

In most cases, the families received calls on weekday mornings when their children were at school, the Mainichi Shimbun reported.

Many callers knew the names of the children they claimed to have abducted and their birth dates. That has led police to believe the callers are in possession of family name lists compiled by schools.

They use children to plead over the phone, "Help me!" or "It's me. They tried to choke me."

One consolation is that most parents didn't pay the ransom because they felt something was wrong. But one mother paid more than $10,000 last month to a caller who claimed he had abducted her 17-year-old son. Later she learned the boy was at school.

 

[den4]

painful career move

Snake charmer quits after 24th bite
From correspondents in Kuala Lumpur
November 10, 2004

IT was the last fang for Malaysian snake-charmer Bidin Mat Hashim when a cobra bit him in front of a Korean television crew. After 24 snakebites in a 50-year career, he's calling it quits.

Bidin, who has been handling snakes since the age of 15 and appeared regularly on television, told the New Straits Times: "I have given serious thought to it and have decided to stop, once and for all."

Bidin, who has been hospitalised several times and required intensive care twice, did not explain why the 24th bite was worse than the others beyond saying: "It was quite painful. And I was having difficulty in breathing."

He had been handling three cobras for a Korean documentary when one bit his right knee.

Apart from his wife and nine children who have urged him to quit for years, Malaysia's snake population may also be relieved by Bidin's retirement - he says he has caught more than 20,000 of the reptiles over the years.