Halloween prop a cry for help

[arely staircase]

MASANJIA, China - The cry for help, a neatly folded letter stuffed inside a package of Halloween decorations sold at Kmart, traveled 5,000 miles from China into the hands of a mother of two in Oregon.

Scrawling in wobbly English on a sheet of onionskin paper, the writer said he was imprisoned at a labor camp in this northeastern Chinese town, where, he said, inmates toiled seven days a week, their 15-hour days haunted by sadistic guards.


"Sir: If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization," said the note, which was tucked between two ersatz tombstones and fell out when the woman, Julie Keith, opened the box in her living room last October. "Thousands people here who are under the persicution of the Chinese Communist Party Government will thank and remember you forever."

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/nation-world/article/hed-4595028.php

no pay link here


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2253572/Julie-Keith-letter-Plea-help-Chinese-labor-camp-worker-stuffed-Oregon-womans-Halloween-decorations.html

[corkhead]

1. the story is apparently behind a pay wall

[Nye Bevan]

2. Alternative link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2253572/Julie-Keith-letter-Plea-help-Chinese-labor-camp-worker-stuffed-Oregon-womans-Halloween-decorations.html

[arely staircase]

5. thanks, i will add that to the op

nt

[Brickbat]

3. Odd that the Chronicle is picking this up now.

[Quantess]

4. This is old. (no text)

[arely staircase]

6. it was in the houston chronicle today

oops, yesterday actually. I'm just now reading Wednesday's paper.

[KittyWampus]

7. It was in NYTimes yesterday. They apparently found the man who wrote the letter. Before many questio

questioned its authenticity.

[Arugula Latte]

8. I posted this in December when it came out in the Oregonian newspaper.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022065694

Here is the thread. Many instantly dismissed it as a hoax.