An SOS from Internet addiction center inmates

Southern Metropolis Daily
August 10, 2009

Deng Senshan, a 16-year-old sent by his parents to an Internet addiction treatment camp in Nanning, Guangxi Autonomous Region, died suddenly on August 2, allegedly after being beaten.

Police closed down the camp and detained a number of employees.

Guangzhou-based Southern Metropolis Daily conducted its own investigation into a related training camp in Guangzhou. It printed its findings in today’s issue:

Following the attention sparked by the incident involving a 16-year-old Guangxi student being beaten to death by instructors at the Nanning Qihang Salvation Training Camp, our reporter discovered that Lizhi-Qihang is also operating in Guangzhou. After the death was exposed, education authorities in Nansha District stated that the program at Haojin Vocational School, which was partnered with Lizhi-Qihang, had been halted.

However, when this reporter visited the school, the Qihang Training Camp was still in operation and the Lizhi Training Camp was still recruiting students. Yesterday afternoon at 3:44, a student in a third-floor dormitory room pleaded to the reporter for help by holding up a bamboo mat with the letters “SOS” written on the back. When instructors rushed upstairs to stop him, the children gestured for the reporter to go to the back side of the school to take pictures.

When the reporter arrived outside the rear wall of the school, children on the third and fourth floors started to stick notes into aluminum cans, drink bottles, and slippers, and others folded notes into paper planes. They tried to throw them over the wall, but owing to the distance, none of them succeeded.

Some children had papers bearing the messages “SOS” and “beating” which they waved out the windows. Some wrote calls for help on their clothing, which they displayed to the reporter. Some even yelled for help. They were all stopped by the instructors.