Woman rescued from underground hole after 6 years

Zhejiang Satellite TV's Citizens Take Action 《绿原公民行动》has uncovered the most extraordinary story of a woman, Wang Xiaocui (王晓翠) who has been rescued from an underground hole in Lin County, Lu Liang District, Shanxi Province. Barely 2 square meters in area, the hole was home for Wang, and this was where she would eat, drink, sleep and take care of ALL her bodily functions everyday for six long years.

As it turned out, Xiaocui was bought by her husband, Guo Runxiao (郭润小) from someone else for RMB6,700. In his youth, Guo was marked an Outstanding Person by the Shanxi Province for academic excellence, but was eventually imprisoned 13 years for rape. By the time he was released, he was already 45 and no woman would marry him. Hence he decided he would buy someone to marry and have children with. Guo saw that Wang was highly educated, smart, good in foreign languages, but she was also mildly mentally disturbed. Nevertheless, he married her and even went on to have two children with her - a 6 year old son and a 4 year old daughter who was born in the hole. But as her mental condition worsened over the years, Wang would start breaking everything at home and hit her children, and it became apparent to Guo that he would have to house her elsewhere.

With the help of the local police, the news crew eventually rescued Wang out of the hole, but not without much coaxing since she had stayed in the hole for six years. They put clothes on her and cleaned her up. At first, even her children would not even come close to her but over the course of the next few days, she had the chance to hug them for the very first time.

On hearing of the heart-wrenching news of her daughter, Wang's 70-year old mother broke down and cried. She said she was the smartest of her kids, was very introverted, and would not say much to people around. However, Wang suffered a severe setback when she didn't make it to the university. She was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia, and her family went around borrowing up to RMB80,000 to pay the doctors to get their favourite daughter well again. To cut the long story short, Wang was married to several men one after the other and even had children with some of them, but was eventually divorced or sold away because of her relapse. This was how she ended up with Guo Runxiao.

This is the first of a 5-part documentary of the rescue of Wang Xiaocui. Parts 2, 3, 4 and 5 can be found here, here, here and here. Wang is currently receiving psychiatric treatment at the Kangfu Hospital in Shanxi Province's Luliang City.