Kidnap gangs plague rich and poor in Venezeula

Observer/Guardian:

A wave of kidnappings across Venezuela is spreading fear and anger among communities who say that criminal gangs are out of control.

Hundreds of men, women and children have been swept off the streets in broad daylight and held for ransom, forcing their families to sell homes and other assets to buy their freedom.

The national assembly debated a bill last week that would make sentences of up to 30 years mandatory for kidnapping, as part of a long-promised government crackdown. Official figures released last week recorded 166 abductions so far this year, more than one a day. Most of the kidnappings go unreported and the real figure is estimated to be up to four times higher.

"It's horrific. We have had four students abducted from the campus," said Briceida Morales, a lecturer at Santa María University in Barinas, the worst hit state. "People are snatched from shopping malls. Women, children, pensioners, it doesn't matter if you're wealthy or not, they take anyone."

In one incident, three men seized a three-year-old girl from her mother at a bus stop in a Barinas slum. The mother gave up the family's most valuable possession, a fridge, to pay the ransom.

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There is more. The problem also effects other South American countries where the rule of law has slipped into a sometime thing, but Venezuela has had a serious crime problem ever since Chavez took over.