‘Bad to the bone’: millions in China shocked by girl, 7, who throws boy into well, mimicking TV drama plot — victim rescued minutes later
- A girl in China threw a little boy into a well and blamed it on a television show, police say
- The story has become an online sensation in China, with more than 100 million reads on Weibo and 10 million views on Douyin
A seven-year-old girl in southwestern China has shocked internet users by throwing a four-year-old boy into a well, saying she was mimicking what she saw on a TV drama.
The boy was rescued after 10 minutes by villagers who heard his cries for help from the almost five-metre-deep well, which was filled with two metres of water, said police in Songming county in Yunnan province, the Beijing News reported.
Surveillance camera records showed the girl and the boy were playing around two wells in their village on March 8, when the girl suddenly lifted the boy up and dropped him into one of the wells.
Seeing the boy grab the well’s edge with his hands, the girl then forced his hands off it, letting the boy fall down into the well. The girl then walked around the well for a moment before leaving the scene.
Minutes later, the boy’s grandmother came to look for him and found the boy in the well after hearing his voice.
She sought help from a young man and they tied a rope around his waist, allowing him to climb in to rescue the boy.
“The boy listened to his grandma’s suggestion to keep still and float in the water. The young man soon saved him,” an anonymous woman in the village told the Beijing News.
“He had a mild cold and cough, perhaps due to inhaling some water.”
The families of the two children are neighbours, and they often played together before the incident, the woman said.
The girl claimed she threw the boy into the well, imitating a plot she saw in a TV series.
An unnamed village committee official said the girl’s family later gave the boy’s family thousands of yuan and some food to apologise.
On March 10, the girl’s family took the boy for a medical check-up, where the boy was given a clean bill of health.
The village official said the two families had reached a settlement over the incident.
“The girl is aware she’s done something wrong,” he said. “Both the two children are still young and they have a low awareness of security.”
The local police urged the public not to disseminate videos of the case to prevent copycat crimes, it said in its statement. It’s not clear whether the girl or her family will face any charges.
The story has become an online sensation in China, with 100 million reads on Weibo and 10 million views on Douyin.
One person commented online: “What is horrific is not that she threw the boy into the well, but that she pulled his hands away from the well edge when he was trying to hang on ... This girl is really bad to the bone.”
“The girl and her parents should be charged. The well should be covered up with a lid,” another person said.
