Putting a feminine twist to the North Caucasus old abduction traditions, two sisters in Chechnya kidnapped their underage step-brothers for ransom, a regional website reported on Friday.
The duo, whose names and ages were withheld, stormed the house of their stepmother in the village of Achkhoi-Martan, knocking her unconscious and abducting her two sons, aged 8 and 11, a local police source told Kavkaz-uzel.ru.
The incident took place “several days ago,” the source said.
The abductors left a note demanding a ransom of 1.5 million rubles ($50,000), Kavkaz-uzel.ru said. However, police traced them the next day to a rented apartment in the republic's capital Grozny, detained both young women and freed the captives unharmed.
A criminal case was opened but this was not confirmed officially as of Friday, the report said. Kidnapping is punishable with prison terms of up to 15 years.
Abduction for ransom remains widespread in the North Caucasus. In an odder case last month, a weightlifting instructor kidnapped at gunpoint in Dagestan turned the tables on the criminals, freeing himself from handcuffs and grabbing their gun to shoot one of them dead and scared the other away.
