Rotten Mango - #195: The Little Red Mansion & The Underground Egg Harvesting Case

Episode Date: September 4, 2022

You’ve heard of the red rooms - the alleged deep web livestreams of people being assaulted, tortured, and killed. The existence of red rooms is largely debated. But have you ever heard of the “Little Red Mansion?” Because this one is very real. The mansion itself was beautiful, filled with crystal chandeliers, gold crown moldings, and massive rooms filled with over-the-top furniture. It felt like an expensive boutique hotel. But for the girls trapped inside it was the biggest nightmare. They were being held hostage, trafficked to high-powered government officials, injected with hormones, and in the end, their eggs were ripped from their bodies to be sold on the black market. If you walked by the Little Red Mansion, you would think it’s a nice building - you would never imagine the secrets it held. Full Source Notes: rottenmangopodcast.com To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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in all states or situations, prices vary based on how you buy. Betta Bing Betta Boo Welcome to this week's mini-sode of Rotten Mango. I'm your host Stephanie Sue. And you've heard of the Red Rooms, right? If you haven't, let me refresh your memory. Red Rooms are supposed dark corners of the deep dark web, where you can watch a real life rape torture session

or murder live. You can even pay money to take part in it. Maybe you want the killer or whoever's behind this shady organization to torture this person in a very specific way. Is that the dark web? Yeah, the red rooms, that's what they're called. You can even put some crypto on the line and get your deepest, darkest wishes fulfilled all in real time.

Sometimes the torture sessions are gruesome, they're bloody, and other times it's someone being forced to dance. Or maybe they're force-fed non-stop. The whole thing is just so creepy, and it's dark. And if you ever come across a real red room, I hope you don't stay for long. But it's kind of up in the air. A lot of people debate if it's even real if this is an urban legend. I mean, who's to say that the people in these red rooms, how would we even know about it if it were true? So a lot of these red rooms are, you know, debatable. But have you heard of the Little Red Mansion? Because this one is very, very real,

and it's very terrifying. Little Red Mansion was different from Redrooms, and same in very different reasons. The Little Red Mansion for starters was beautiful. It was in a regular room in some dungeon anywhere. It was that European style mansion. Crystal chandeliers adorning the ceilings, just illuminating the beautiful marble walls. There were marble columns in these dining halls, gold details everywhere, plush furniture that you just wanna melt into, giant pieces of art that take up the entirety of an entryway. It's the type of art that you look up at

and you're like, wow. How do they even get this through the door? It's massive. There's a reception hall inside, double doors. The ceilings have gold, crown moldings. I mean, they're intricate. Other rooms have these big, vaulted ceilings that are bathed in sunlight with chandelier, suspending, and glistening in the air. Even the tiles of floor were filled with gold powder. It was six stories tall, and each room was outfitted like a hotel room. Each room had a comfortable, spacious bed, some furniture. It was enough to make someone feel

at home. I mean, you would walk in and think, huh, it kind of feels like a very upscale boutique hotel. The host obviously went through a lot of trouble it seemed. They left you an iPhone, an iPad with manuals. What would they need that for? We'll find out soon enough. But most of the time, the rooms are empty. You can't just rent these rooms on a website like Airbnb or even a hotel website.

Even though the interior looks like some sort of fancy boutique hotel, the whole place is relatively empty. Released to feel empty, except one room on the sixth floor. It's hidden behind a secret door. From the outside, the door looks like a mirror. Maybe you stare into the reflection, maybe you check your hair, fix your outfit. But only if you knew where to pull, you could open the mirror. When you walk inside, you see this massive room.

It was called the 14-beauties suite. It had seven large bunk beds that were embedded into the walls, with the same class and sheikness that was throughout the whole mansion. The bunk beds were built in. Each bunk bed had a velvet curtain that could be closed. The white ladders looked like they were made of very expensive wood. The ceiling had that beautiful crown molding, and in the middle of the marble floors there were tables and desks, almost like make-up vanities. An attach to this room was another dressing room,

enough space for seven people at one time. All the other rooms felt eerie and quiet, but this one it felt kind of lively. It felt lived in, and at first glance it might seem like a boarding school. Because you open up the closet and they're filled with women's clothes. lingerie, props, books, son, female etiquette. There were schedules posted to the walls of when each girl was going to dancing class, ballet class.

But it wasn't a boarding school. Because the girls would sit down next to each other, limping. Dark circles under their eyes. Their souls looked dead when they stared into the mirror, and they would carefully put the powder to cover their bruises. But there was a pain that they couldn't cover with makeup. The pain of having their eggs harvested.

Their eggs? Their eggs. And now they had to go meet with some clients who would rape them and film it all on the little iPhones that were left in each room. They tried to support each other, the girls, but it was hard. Frank was always turning them against each other. They all came from different backgrounds, but now in this room they felt similar.

They felt like they understood each other. Everything that they went through, how they felt that anger, that hurt, that PTSD, they were so similar in so many ways. And maybe you couldn't see it. Maybe it's just all the pain that they buried deep. But each of them had the same tattoo on their private parts. It read, only for Frank. They had all been branded. As always, full show notes are available at rotinmanglepodcast.com, but this case, from the moment that I heard about it, I barely scratched the surface.

I mean, my jaw was on the ground. I was steaming with anger. It was such a full body hatred that I felt for these people involved. I knew that I had to talk about it, especially because this case itself was being suppressed for the longest time. So the fact that this is a foreign case, I had two professional translators that helped me dig up as much as possible on this. And let's get right into it because I need you to feel the emotions that I felt.

632 of Shu Chang Road. There's a little building on the corner. Okay, it's not little, it's pretty big, it's six stories tall. And it takes up an entire corner of real estate. It's technically called the Chuan Fu Building, but everyone, the locals in Shanghai, they call it little red mansion.

It's funny because the building isn't even red. It hasn't been for a while. The first floor almost has this clay washed out turmeric shade to it. It used to be red, now it's more of this weird, mauved pinkish color. It's like the favorite shirt that you've ignored the dry cleaning instructions on one too many times.

Used to be red, not so much anymore. Then above that, the rest of the building, it turns into this yellowish color. Not the bright, happy kind of yellow that makes you think of like lemons and summer days. It doesn't feel refreshing. Feels faded and washed out. It's not an ugly mansion or a building.

It's not even an eye sore. It's just a bit worn out. That's all. But here's the curious detail that the locals cannot seem to get over. The building doesn't exist. OK, it's a bit bizarre, but it's like a black hole appeared on the maps on this very corner,

where this very building stands. So you're not going to be able to find the building on public maps, even when you're on your phone maps. You won't see it show up as a pin next to your favorite coffee shop. You can't even get Tao Bao delivered here, which is like Amazon. Amazon and Tao Bao pride themselves on delivering just about anywhere. So why on earth can't they deliver to a relatively busy street in the middle of Shanghai, one of the busiest well connected technologically advanced cities in the entire world? That is weird. It's weird and maybe you're thinking okay. It's curious Stephanie. It's weird

But why on earth do the locals even care? Do they have too much time on their hands? Are they all care-ins? When you live in a place like Shanghai where every inch of space goes for an astronomical amount of money and every piece of land seems to be accounted for, you can't help but notice when things seem a little bit off, when things seem a little bit strange. That building that you never see people go in and out of, the one that never gets deliveries or has any signs of life, but it's clear that it's not abandoned. In fact, it's heavily guarded. It's almost as if someone doesn't want you to find out what's going on in there. I mean, that's gonna cause some people to get a bit curious, right?

Because you know what they say. Curiosity killed the cat. Jean wasn't really curious by nature. Jean, I don't think she had enough time on her hands to be. She was busy, she's constantly on the go-go-go trying to get stuff done. She had done everything right. She went to a good school in the US, graduated, comes back to Shanghai in 2017, and she's looking for a job.

Technically, it should have been easy because everyone told her, you did everything right. The fact that you even got to America, got to study there, that's crazy. I mean, she's probably sick of hearing these words. But apparently, while she was overseas studying, her parents had run into a lot of trouble. Jean's parents' family business failed. The business lawsuits were coming back to back just slapping them in the face, and it forced Jean to try and find a job. ASAP.

Now, I don't know if this is how it works in Shanghai, but this is the gist of what I was getting. But it seems like a lot of companies have hiring seasons almost. So there's a specific time where everybody hires. It's not like this process that's ongoing all year long. Yeah, it's like college. Yeah. What is it called? Entrance exams.

It's like a company exam. Like hiring, like a big facility and then there's a bunch of, you know, companies hiring. Yeah, so I think the timing just was lost. And she wasn't able to get the dream opportunity, but she needed a job right away. And she's thinking, okay, well, it's fine. I'm gonna get a temporary job and I'm gonna use my degree later, right?

She's browsing online, looking for the fastest, easiest, well-paying job that she can find. She didn't have time to go through the 2,912 series of interviews, and she just needed a job. She finds a listing. Clicks on the title. An assistant position for Shanghai's legal channel program. Okay, it sounds like some sort of marketing, media job, or government-run media organization of some sort.

She does a quick search of the program and sledge it. Okay, assistant position not bad not bad at all. She submits an application and she doesn't know if they do even go through. Password the shot and to her surprise and her excitement she gets a call. The director of the program. Zhao Fuqiang. We're gonna call him Frank okay. Now Frank wanted to interview her for the assistant position and she just needed to meet with him at 632 of Shu Chong Road or as the locals call it, Little Red Mansion. Jean hadn't really heard of it,

just nervous for her interview. She's practicing her answers in the mirror. She gets ready, picking her best outfit, she could find, her palms are sweaty, and it only gets worse as she walks up to this big six-story building. The building is heavily outfitted with security cameras, pointing in every single direction. It's not even just one in the front, one for the side and the other side in the back. It felt like every square inch of the surrounding grounds had a camera directly pointed at it,

looking down, serving what are they looking for. Okay. Maybe she's a bit underqualified. This seems like an intense place to work. It felt very high security level clearance type of business. She's greeted by Frank at the front and she kind of feels better. You know, the building was a very safe place. Jean tried to keep up with Frank,

as he let her down the hallways, her heels are clinking on the marble floors. There's a lot to take in. Frank tries to explain the building setup. We took a lot of precautions in making the working environment professional yet organized. It's very modern on the inside. Each room has an access card that you'll need in order to scan so that you can get access to the room.

In the security guards, they're all ex-military professionals. What? Wow. Why so much security? Well considering our line of work, we have a lot of government officials coming in and out of the building, so it's important for us to have top notch security. Wow. She's impressed.

I mean, it felt like this high level important work should probably be fulfilled. She might make a difference here, you know? Jean felt that bubbly excitement, and it seemed like Frank liked her. And everyone she ran into during her tour and her interview, they seemed to love Frank. Frank the boss! One of the employees had a spare moment and was alone with Jean, and Frank was off, I don't know, tending to something important. The employee said, you know Frank is really nice.

He's rich, but simple. He's kind. He's even donated a three-lane road in his hometown. He came from the village and the hometown roads were really bad there. So he donated three roads. He's a type of guy that just never forgets his roots, you know? It's been kind of wild working for someone like him. I mean, now Jean is really impressed. Maybe this isn't just going to be a boss. Maybe this would be a mentor. Someone to guide her in this world. I mean, she wanted to donate roads, she wanted to give back to the world. So of course, she's over the freaking moon when she's told that she's got the position. And she's told to report back for her first day of work. And she's laying in bed, thinking of all the possibilities.

Maybe she would escort government officials from meeting to meeting. Maybe she would take notes during these meetings. Oh my god, the emails, the errands. I mean, she was nervous, but she's competent and she's very confident. So our first day, she shows up at the Little Red Mansion. It was nothing like her initial thoughts. But not just in the way that the job is never what it seems. This was Jean's worst nightmare. This was any person's worst nightmare. Jean realized that all those access cards that people needed to enter the rooms, they were also put in place so that you couldn't exit a room without it. And on the first day of work,

Jean was never given any access cards. She was told that she wouldn't need them because she wasn't gonna be leaving. What? Yeah, it's like, what, I mean, that doesn't even make sense, you know, this is in the middle of Shanghai, how do you hold employees hostage in the middle of a city like this on a busy corner street? I mean, what doesn't even make sense, you know? This is in the middle of Shanghai. How do you hold employees hostage in the middle of a city

like this on a busy corner street? I mean, what are you even saying? The little red mansion was a big complicated labyrinth. It's like a maze on the inside, especially the top floor, the sixth floor where Jean was placed. Each hallway, each room was locked with keypads. There were security guards everywhere,

eyeing everyone up and down, cameras all around the outside of the building. Jean was told that she wouldn't be an assistant in the Little Red Mansion. She was going to be a sex worker for government officials. She was to call her parents, tell them that she found work, she was going to send money back to them because it was a city away, which they would send money through Frank, which Jean worked for, but other than that, Jean would get no money of her own in the Little Red Mansion.

So while Jean is soaking this in, this is her first day of work. She thought she was going to be a sister, and I mean, she's shocked. While she's in shock, Frank rips her and films a sexual assault for later Blackmail. He told her, now it's official. Even if the guards and the keypads weren't here, you're not gonna be leaving because I would leak this everywhere. This was the start of Jean's nightmare.

For months, Jean was beaten into submission. She was humiliated, starved, tortured, raped, recorded. And finally, she begged after months, she begged Frank to let her go to the bank so that she could send some more money to her parents. She had money in her account that was just sitting there and her parents needed it. So he agreed. I mean, this was her moment.

This is her great escape. Jean was shaking in front of the bank teller. Underneath her clothes, she had bruises everywhere. Frank wasn't there. He wasn't watching her. But he expected her to come back soon enough and that alone is terrifying. She whispers to the bank teller. Can you call the police please?

Right now, I need to talk to them. Listen, I don't know the fear that must have gone through both of these people in that moment. Jean feeling like she's going to be taken back by Frank and beaten some more, tortured, desperately looking for help. And the bank teller who probably feels like they're being robbed. So the police come, they take Jean to the police station, and she tells them everything. And at first she's like, oh, thank God, like I feel so much relief.

Someone is helping me now. I'm safe. I can go home. I can forget this and Frank is going to jail. But then she notices some oddities. The police aren't taking notes. Why not? I mean, how are you guys going to remember all the details, all the rooms that I'm describing to you, all the rooms that I was forced to stay in? Why aren't you asking me any questions or taking pictures of my wounds or my bruises?

Should I do a rape kid or something? Don't you want to see the evidence? Does any one want a picture for the record? And she starts noticing her heartbeat, ringing in her temples because it's like do you guys not care about what happened? Do you not? You don't want to take a record. And the police officers, they sit back in their chair. They just kind of exchange words with each other. They said, be honest, it's not that bad, isn't it? You're being a bit dramatic, don't you

think? And it's pretty nice being with a man like Frank now. He's rich, he's powerful. What's there not to like about the guy? People would dream about being with someone like him. And just like that, Frank rushed into the police station and took Jean back to the little red mansion. Jean was locked in the girl's dorm, beaten by Frank into submission, or at least so he thought. Jean promised herself that she would keep her eyes on the ground to look totally broken but she would never give up. Frank was a really bad boss, okay, for obvious reasons, but he was really a despicable person.

His favorite way of keeping all the girls in check was through mind games. He loved to manipulate the girls that he essentially sex trafficked. He would criticize them He would put them up on these little pedestals and then shoot them down one by one He would completely incinerate any self-esteem that they had he would get up in their face and spit at them He would say things like your dog shit, you know that? You're nothing more than human waste. You don't even deserve to be alive But I'm keeping you alive. You should be thinking me really. And then when the girls would be at their very lowest, their breaking point, when they're

willing to end it all, risk it all. Frank would appear in the doorway as if he's this, this hero. And he would scoop these girls up and say, I'm gonna fix you, okay? And only I can do that. And you know, you can't live without me, can you? And that's how you made these girls feel. Well, not all of them. He tried. There was one girl that ran to him anytime he spoke, whether she did it out of survival, or now out of her own will,

it was confusing to the other girls. Let's call her Lucy. Lucy to the other girls was just as bad as Frank. Lucy had been once married to Frank. They were divorced now. But the fact that anyone would want to marry Frank was beyond them. Who would, is this before you knew what he did?

Why would you want to marry him? Whether you're doing intense to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into warrior one in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby, or counting your breaths on the subway.

Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are, whenever we need it. Download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier, or pay to description starting at $12.99 per month. Why would you break into these apartments? For money, for drugs, whatever was in there? at 12.99 per month. It was the height of the crack era, and instead of locking up drug dealers, some New York City cops had become them. I would suit up in my uniform and we're going to want some drug dealers. And I know how to do it really well.

This is the inside story of the biggest police corruption scandal in NYPD history and the investigation that uncovered it all. Did you consider yourself a rat? 100% I saved my soul just like everybody else does. Listen to and follow the set, an Odyssey originals documentary podcast series available now in the Odyssey app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your shows. I'm not a big guy man but I love being that dirty mother f***er. But the story goes like this, Lucy met Frank when she was young.

They got married. And then quickly divorced because, you know, Frank just wanted to do other things. Lucy was encouraging a wall of Frank's business ideas, including letting him pimper out. It's said that she even cut off her own philopean tubes to show her loyalty so that she could never have children. She could never fall pregnant during sex work.

It was her way of saying, I'll sleep with whoever Frank wanted me to. I mean, it's clear. It is so clear that at one point Lucy was a victim, and probably still is, but now she's spent most of her days terrorizing the other girls. She likened herself as the keeper of the brothel. Frank lets her abuse and beat disobedient girls, and if you want Frank to find something out, all you have to do is Hint at it near Lucy and Frank will know if Lucy ever saw you crying from oh, I don't know being kidnapped held hostage tortured raped and sex trafficked

She would say something along the lines of We're all here willingly devoting ourselves to the company. It's your problem that you aren't willing to you need to fix it That was Lucy. I mean, Jean was shocked. She couldn't get over the fact that Lucy had willingly cut off her own filetian tubes like that's allegedly, that's crazy. But then soon she experienced it all herself. Jean said that she was forced to take ovulation injections for more than 10 days. She knew what it was, she could feel it, her body was changing, she had heard

from all the other girls what was going on. And then after 10 days, Jean was secretly rushed to a hospital where her eggs were taken out of her body and she got no painkillers for it. Isn't this super, super painful? Yeah, okay. So there, let me explain. There are so many levels to this that are so terrifying. The first being that, well, of, Jeanne didn't consent to this. She had no idea why these people wanted her eggs or what they were doing with it, but because profits were the most important it seemed, Jeanne was given way too much hormonal

drugs. Meaning, she was given way more than you would medically receive in order to retrieve eggs for something like IVF, in vitro fertilization, right? Now, if you take a ton of these hormonal drugs, patients can easily start experiencing things like obesity, swelling, stomach ache, blurred vision, accelerated aging. I mean, you're in for a rough time, vomiting. Usually, when you're taking these hormones,

you have to have a lot of medical supervision. It is not something that's taken lightly. I'm sure we all know someone or know someone who knows someone who has undergone IVF. Listen, it is so emotionally taxing. I knew a family member who underwent IVF and just what your body goes through the hormone changes, it's a lot. So for most women, even if they're put under during the operation, you're still going to feel pain. And if it's not done well or right in this case with Jean and the other girls that are literally being sex-trafficked and egg-harvested, we can assume it probably wasn't done properly. For example, Jean was at risk of her bladder rupturing.

The instruments used to extract her eggs could have easily punctured her intestine or any vessel that could cause hemorrhaging. In severe cases, that could be life-threatening. Sometimes, they pierce the ovary and it could continue to bleed. There's always risk of infection after any sort of procedure or operation. And that's exactly what happened to Jean. She was so sick after her egg harvesting, egg retrieval, it caused her to accumulate a ton of fluid in her lower belly area. It made her look six to seven months pregnant for a really long time,

but that's not even the worst part. I mean, that's painful. It's not just like, oh, like you look bloated, you look pregnant. No, it's painful. The worst part is she had to be hospitalized for a month because of the infection, and she found out that she would never, ever be able

to have kids for the rest of her life. Wow. Why? Because Frank the rest of her life. Wow. Why? Because Frank decided he wanted her eggs. So is he gonna let her go now? Now that she's completely broken or at least she feels that way? No. He's clearly not one with morals.

Let me tell you what he does with the eggs. And she doesn't find out until she signs all these contracts. Okay, she gets back from the hospital. She gets raped further, videotaped, and blackmailed after this painful experience. If she ever showed hatred towards Frank or anyone, she would be beaten to an inch of her life. Then she was forced to sign a contract. Frank forced her to sign a legal labor contract that set. If she ever tried to leave, she would pay him $50,000. Of money that she didn't have, and Frank only sent Jean's parents enough money so that

they wouldn't be suspicious of their daughter being gone. But Jean's not making any money for anything that she did, not the sex work she was forced into and definitely not the agarvesting that she was forced into. If Jean ever needed money for whatever reason, maybe her parents needed a little extra help that month. Frank would drag her to the desk, sit her down, force her to sign a receipt, basically an IOU. Frank would sit there and whip out an interest rate out of his bum and force her to sign

it. So every single day, Jean is getting riddled and riddled with more and more debt to her capture. I mean, I know what you're thinking. Well, I mean, the debt means nothing, right? She should still escape, and nobody's really gonna sue her for not paying her kidnapper in a perfect world. But none of this should be happening in the first place if it was a perfect world. So Gina scared, I mean, she knew that she's not the only one either. Most of the girls in the Little Red Mansion had some form of egg harvesting done. Most of the time, Frank would sell the eggs

that he harvested from the young girls. Each egg could be sold on the black market for about 1500 to $7,500 per egg. What did they all that just dissold for some quick cash? Yeah. And for normal procedures, an average of 10 to 20 eggs is taken, meaning Frank could easily be making 30,000 to 150,000, depending on the eggs and the age of the girls that they were quote, harvested from. Now this is where it gets even more sick.

And I, like I genuinely don't even know the emotions that I was feeling during all of this. If Frank was fond of one of the girls in particular, if he liked them, or if she was bringing in a ton of clients with her sex work or if government officials really liked her, he wanted another way to be able to control her other than just violence and threats. So he would take his sperm, an egg of hers, and create an embryo. He would find a surrogate mother and impregnate her through IVF, and have a child with his captive through a surrogate. Wow. So he's using that to control them even further? and have a child with his captive through a surrogate.

Wow. So he's using that to control them even further? Yes, because at the end of the day, a mother will love her kids usually. And I mean, just the sheer amount of steps that this takes, it's not easy, it's not simple, it's not as easy as getting an egg in a sperm and just injecting it into someone.

It's really hard, even with IVF to get an egg that sticks and becomes a viable pregnancy, it's rough. But Frank would go through all the hoops. He tried his best to make it happen. Again, not because he wanted children. I mean, nobody wanted his children. But because if the woman had children, he could control them better. He could use their children as pawns, as weapons, as little chess pieces. Because in the end, I mean all this guy cares about is having a military of unserving followers and money-making machines. He was a sex trafficker at heart.

Really, even when you get to know his childhood, everything just clicks. I mean, it makes sense that he turned out the way that he did, that he was just pure evil. Frank wasn't always the monster of Shanghai. He would later become Shanghai's very own parasite, but, you know, there once was a time where he was just Frank from the countryside. Frank was the first born son.

His mom died when he was young, and she actually died giving birth to Frank's younger sister. So at which side note, a lot of people believe that this added to a lot of his anger with women. I mean, it's not his mom or his sister's fault, clearly, but he might have been upset that he didn't have a mother figure growing up. That anger transfers to woman.

He's upset that his mom left. AKA, died. So he's mad. And then he's most likely upset that his sister being born took his mom from him, which led him to transferring more anger onto women. So that's freaking fantastic. But anyway, Frank was the only son in the family and the first born. So he puffed up his chest and he was ready to take on the family

name. His Chinese name, like you mentioned, literally meant wealthy and strong. This guy wakes up feeling like he's destined for greatness. I mean, it's a pretty basic name, but he feels like he's the only one with that name. Everyone in the family treated him like he was God's gift to Earth. His dad forced Frank's younger sister to support Frank at every whim to make way for him. If Frank is tired, you should get up and let him lay down instead. He's the future of this family. If there was ever a dish on the table that had some proteins and meat, everyone sat around while Frank hungrily dug in.

He had all the good food, the drinks, the necessities, everything. It was offered up to Frank first, and the family just didn't have enough to go around. So I guess they were really putting all their eggs in this one basket. They tried to be noble. They felt like it was a sacrifice they're making. You know, it's fair. It's fair. It's not for Frank really, it's for all of us. Frank Frank is gonna go out there, be rich and successful, and bring joy and money to the family. Woo! So like, were they happy when Frank sat them down and said that he was quitting middle school? To go out there and try to make some money?

Yeah, they were not. They were not happy at all. You bet there were some words and fists exchanged, but Frank was never wanted to listen to his screaming begging family members. So he just wanted to go out and start making money right now. and fists exchanged, but Frank was never one to listen to his screaming begging family members. So he just wanted to go out and start making money right now. He traveled from his small little village to Shanghai and he starts working at this tailor shop. And his dream is simple. He's like, I'm gonna grow up.

I'm gonna open my own tailor shop. And maybe I'm gonna have these beautiful designs. If people love him, I'll have my own clothing brand or something, my own manufacturing business. I mean, this is a far, far reach from a guy who ends up creating a multi-hundred million dollar network for sex trafficking. So how did we get from Little Taylor Frank to this? What went wrong?

So the guy is killing it. I mean, everybody loves his tailoring. His bosses, his mentors, they love him. He had unique designs that he created with spare fabrics. He never wasted any material, which was the number one rule. So they start paying him a little bit more. They're like, no, no, no, you don't have to go to the other tailor and work for them. You got to stay with us. Here, here's some more money.

And soon, the guy has his own tailoring business. And even till this point, I mean, Frank sounds nice. Apparently, the more successful Frank became, he started doing a lot of good things. He starts giving back to his village, helping the villagers build houses and roads and giving them financial help when they needed it. But even then, the villagers said that they saw right through Frank. I mean, they would be dumb not to take his help. Let's be real.

But they knew what he was doing it for. Frank is not just some nice guy. He wanted everyone to know that he had gone out and made it. A villager said, you know, Frank is one of those people. If he has $100 in his pocket, he would brag to everyone that knew him that he had $500 in his pocket. And you know, the villagers, we know that this guy's money is on legit. There's no way he's earning this amount of money by working on a tailoring shop or his

own tailoring shop. But we don't like to ask questions. And again, at least he's giving back to the village, right? Frank's younger sister remembered how happy their dad was, how proud of Frank he was. When Frank came and built them a new house and hung up these street lights and even donated new roads for the village, anytime Frank came to visit,

he showed up like a freaking superstar in a fancy car surrounded and filled to the brim with women. And nobody knew that all of this, the new roads, the houses, they were all at the cost of women's blood sweat and tears. And a lot of blood there was. It all started when Frank was doing market research. That's what he called it.

Taylor and Clothes is great. People want to look good. It's not a necessity though. You know, in economic good times, everybody gets their clothes hemmed, gets new clothes custom made, but it's not a product that people can't live without. And that gets them thinking, you know? What is something that everybody wants?

What's something that's irreplaceable? He's looking around in the Shanghai area where his tailoring shop is, he notices, huh, strange. Look right there and there and another one there and another one down the block. Why are there so many freaking beauty in a hair salon? And he starts counting. In the small area of about 19 square miles, there were about 344 different hair salons. Here's the thing about these hair salons. Even when the economy slows down, it's jam packed. On the weekdays, it's jam packed. On the weekends, it's jam packed.

And I'm sure some of them really did cater to women who loved their hair or men who needed cuts, right? But a lot of them, Frank realized it wasn't a simple hair business. Because he never saw women entering or exiting. He mainly saw men. But when they left their hair, didn't look shorter or neater or more trimmed, in fact sometimes it looked messier, like they were running their hands through

it when they walked down. We know where this is going. Frank knew where this is going. The hair salons were covers for brothels. And Frank thought, okay, that's a profitable business. That's never going to run out. There will always be a market for sex and for women and for me to make money off of that. He gathers up as much money as he can from his tailoring business, opens up two hair

salons, and his first employee was his first wife. He sat her down and he tried to sell her the dream. Listen, it's just for now. You should sacrifice for us because I've sacrificed so much. If you truly love us and you see a future together, we need to do this. You don't have to keep doing it just until we get enough money and then I'm gonna replace you with other girls Just help me get the business started and then you can help me run it after. She fell for it I mean she starts engaging in sex work and again sex work is completely fine

But this this is him gaslighting and pressuring his wife into it and he has no intention of living a happy life with her. He just wanted to use her. So while she's busy at work, Frank starts browsing online, going on internet, internet forums, mass chat groups, looking for girls who are down to work in a hair salon. You don't even need experience, you would say. I'm going to pay you, I'm going to pay you to train you. And soon you're going to be snipped, snipping at people's hair and making a whole bunch of money.

Some of these girls are women that came forward later to say that Frank was a little demon. His go-to method was to reach out to you, promise you a job. And then when you meet up with him, he would turn it into a date of sorts. He knew that you were in a vulnerable position, you just told him your family needs money, you're in financial ruins, you're willing to do anything. And he's sitting there in this fancy car showering you with compliments and yeah, eventually you guys might have sex and you might even feel like you're falling in love. But be careful because he's not.

Instead he's there whispering like this evil little snake, promising you the world. How he's going to take care of you for the rest his life, as long as you promise to do one thing, one super easy simple thing. And he would say things like, come on, it's sex work, but it's making money together for the family, the family. It's like a cult. A lot of women, they were vulnerable, they said yes.

And if they didn't, Frank would beat them into submission, or he would say, oh, we'll remember the sex that we just had at the hotel. I recorded the whole thing and I'm going to threaten to send it to everyone you know. I'm going to say I was a client. So either you let everyone think you're a sex worker, make no money or you are a sex worker, no one needs to know and you make money. So he blackmailed them. In every sense of the word, he threw them into the hair salon's charge clients a whopping

$23 for sexual services, and all that money would go straight into Frank's pocket. The woman never saw a dime of it. They would be given small allowances here and there for them to send back to their own parents, you know, to make sure that their parents never got worried or paranoid of like, where the hell is my kid?

So with this new influx of cash, Frank starts opening up more and more hair salons, and even venturing off into real estate. Listen, this guy was horrible to people. Do you think he's gonna be a good landlord? No. His whole business model was to scam tenants,

and if they ever threatened legal action, he would straight up send a gang to their house to scare them off. Apparently, he said this to his tenant multiple times, and I don't even know what this means, but he would get up in his face and said, I have disabled people and psychopaths that work for me. I can play this game with you.

I don't even know what that means. I don't even know what form of threatening and blackmail that is, but apparently that's what he said. If you were late on rent by one day, your whole rent, let's say, if it's $1,000 for the whole month, if you were late one day by paying it, Frank would force you to think that you owed him $10,000. A $9,000 late fee for one day. If you relate three days,

Frank would forcefully kick you out and threaten you. He would say that he still needs his late fee payment and the rent, and he knows where you're going next, so you better sleep with when I open. Then he would rinse and repeat the place of replacing the former tenants and repeating and from these businesses and the sex trafficking, it's estimated that during his career, Frank was able to make close to $156 million. $156 million. This guy had control over, I think,

1,300 shops all over Shanghai's nine districts. He was exploiting women in hair salon businesses It was a lot How long of a time was it? Yeah, he was operating for over 20 years But I mean it doesn't matter how long of a time a hundred and fifty six million dollars and two million lifetimes is insane But come on before you feel hatred towards Frank just know that he had a hard life too. He had problems. It was an all-easy. Sometimes Frank had ruthless competition. Maybe like a woman named Zoe.

Zoe was another business owner of multiple hair salons. She was cut throughout. Zoe was intense. She was the worst version of Frank almost. That's what people called her, which I don't even know if that's possible. Zoe liked to recruit in prison girls that were anywhere between 16 to 20 years old, and for years. She chained them up, trafficked them, and if they refused to listen or put up a fight, she would beat them, abuse them, and even force them to drink their own urine. One girl had her head forced into water

for so long that she lost consciousness, and both her eardrums were perforated. She said, But she lost consciousness, and both her eardrums were perforated. She said, I felt water fill my nostrils and ears, and the more that I struggled, the worse I started to feel. Then I suffocated. I lost my consciousness, I thought I was going to die. I mean, there's no way. The girl escaped, but she said she has PTSD. She has lifelong conditions that she suffers from.

She can't even shower. Any time a large part of her body gets wet, she has to cover her ears with a shower cap or something. She's terrified. Even washing her face with cold water makes her feel terrified and suffocated. I mean Zoe, the trafficker was ruthless. She always wore bright pink. But don't be fooled, you know. She's not fun and bubbly. Zoe was fast on her feet. The girls that worked for Zoe or were held captive by Zoe said that she was more evil than Frank, probably because she understood female psychology very well. She knew, went to be nice to a girl and get her trust, and then went to be brutal to her. She was manipulative, she knew what her male clients wanted, and she was very in tune with her

business. For example, Frank loved to show off luxury cars and he loved to sit there and promise girls the world and that he was successful and he was gonna take care of them Zoe scoff she thought I was dumb Girls know that that's too good to be true Even if they want to believe it with their whole hearts. I never flaunt my money I invite girls to be my hair Apprentice she would say you know, I'm just looking to teach and maybe one day you can run my hair salon when I get old. Either that or you can go back to your hometown that you hate. Or you can stay in Shanghai and work here, cutting hair.

It's gonna be hard, but we'll make it work. The girls were less suspecting of Zoe because, I mean, it's not too good to be true. It felt like a real opportunity. It made sense. I hate her. One of the youngest victims Zoe had was a 12 year old-old girl that she kept locked up in the hair salon. 12. And if you ever tried to run from Zoe, she would break your leg.

And I'm not saying that as an exaggeration, she would break your leg. It was a message to all the other girls, as don't even try. Don't even try to run. Zoe ran the house like it was some sort of old-and-day dynasty. The girls, when they weren't being trafficked, they were forced to brush Zoe's hair. And if at any moment her eyelid twitched, Zoe's eyelid would twitch. You know, you've ever had an eye twitch? Yeah, you eyelid jumped, right?

She would call all the girls over, girls, get around, and she would beat each of them until they were bloody. Apparently, Zoe is a superstitious person, and she believed that each of them until they were bloody. Apparently Zoe is a superstitious person and she believed that an eyelid jumping meant that misfortune was coming your way. And the only way to negate that bad luck is to release that tension. Again, neither of these things, the eyelid jumping

or the consequential beatings have any sort of scientific basis other than feeling. So I don't even know how she came up with the idea that these beatings would help negate the bad luck because I don't know in my head if anything, I'm like, wouldn't it cause more bad luck because bad karma? But she would just beat them.

It seemed like Zoe wanted an excuse. She desperately wanted an excuse to dish out whatever violence and anger she had in her system. She hated these young women. Which I don't know. Why do I feel like Zoe is the jealous, horrid, wretched character type that's just jealous of all these younger girls and that triggers her? But Zoe wasn't going to outbeat Frank, at least in the business sense.

Because August 2013, Zoe was arrested. A few girls ran off from the hair salon, headed to the local police station. None of the girls, the victims, were ever compensated after Zoe was arrested, charged, and convicted. All of them would live with PTSD. Most of them had some sort of gynecological issues. A lot of them had more severe compression fractures or bone fractures,

like when Zoe would break their legs and it would never heal properly. And the girls never received any payment, nothing. And worst of all, I mean, because we live in a society, these girls live with this shadow that they've been trafficked. They live with this cytol judgment, the looks, the paranoia of something happening again to them. I don't even think Frank cared. Frank was dominating at this point. He was able to build connections with higher officials

in the city, big business figures that are well connected to police officers, police chiefs, government officials, judges, you name it. Frank had them all in his contact list. And Frank realized, you know, it's one thing to have these hair salons and sex traffic and then pay off these officials. It's another thing to provide sex work to these officials.

So we gotta think bigger. Hair salons were baby money. Sure, it's gonna bring in money. He's gonna keep a lot of them open but these big business powerful men, these movers and shakers in their industries, they can't be seen walking in and out of a shady hair salon in this district. It'd be suspicious. Someone's wife is going to

find out. Someone's political opponent is going to find out. Are you kidding? So Frank uses a ton of that money that he made and he purchases the building on 632 Shuchang Road, the little red mansion. He set up a company as a front and got straight to work. The inside of the building was described as beautiful. Magnificent is a word that people use a lot when they walk in. I mean, it was beautiful. And Frank knew that his whole business plan needed a shift. His clients were different now.

You know, they're the businessmen of the world. They're sure they want sex workers, but they want ones that they can hang out with to drink with the cultured ones. So Frank set up that legal business and started looking for assistance and You know all of these different people that have a college education Frank thought he would be an innovative businessman and started curating a roster of trafficked women that had educational backgrounds and he liked ones that had some sort of special talent

Be it ballet performance arts, you know that kind of stuff Frank created luxury sweets for his clients He even remodeled the place to have three hidden doors to hide behind in case the place was rated Which that wouldn't happen because Frank is in with the cops, you know who's gonna raid the place when the cops are in the place already They had discrete exits security, I mean, Frank thought of everything. The government officials and clients would go straight to the girls' room,

the bunk bed room, and they would pick out their victim. Then the girl would freshen up and be led to one of the luxurious suites. And if Frank really trusted a client, he would even let the clients book the girls for a weekend to take them on trips. If Frank ever saw the girls looking so sad or depressed, they would be beat, they would be punished.

The girls were forced to pretend to love their time there. They were to sing and dance and entertain these men. They were forced to read about how to please men and be the perfect quiet lady that's interesting enough that adds depth to intellectual conversations without outshining the man, how to flush their best smiles, how to be their best smiles,

how to be flirtatious and coy. One of Frank's favorite quotes from a book was, being cultured is something that is the ultimate in life. A cultured woman is like a flower. It never loses its smell. Instead, it becomes increasingly beautiful. But I mean, let's be real. The Frank, the customers, the girls, they all knew that these girls would rather be anywhere else in the world. And well, you know where this story goes. So during this time,

Gina's kept locked up in the Little Red Mansion and Frank thinks she's broken, she's given up, but she's pissed. She's actually planning her second escape. And June of 2018, she sneaks out. Frank finds her again, threatens to expose her new, to her videos, her sex work history, and even threatens to create a baby from the eggs that he harvested against her will.

But Jean dug her feet in the ground, and she said, do it then. And she would later be one of the main witnesses at Frank's court trial. Which speaking of trial, you're like, okay, well how did Frank get caught? Tell me everything. A girl named Sway She, let's call her Sherry. Sherry was being trafficked by Frank. She had had her eggs harvested just like Jean, and she was struggling with severe depression, anxiety disorders. She had been tricked. She thought that she had her whole life planned ahead of her.

Sherry was actually going to Korea to study, and in between the time that she had before she left Shanghai to go to Korea, she had a few months to kill. And she's like, okay, well, why am I going to sit around and do nothing when I can just add things to my resume and my free time? So she applies to this job with Frank. And Frank not only raped her, tortured her, trafficked her, he harvested her eggs,

and she was one of the girls that he created a child with. He even forced Sherry's mom into registering the surrogate babies in Shanghai. And the babies they were born again Sherry's will. And she was, I mean, I can't even imagine the complexity of those feelings. Like, these are your babies at the end of the day, but also the father is this man that put you through all of this.

He's your repissed, your trafficker, your kidnapper, your hostage taker, your captor. I can't even imagine the guilt, the depression. So at the end of the year, she somewhat gains Frank's trust and she finds a chance to run away. She runs out of the little red mansion and hides in a hostel. She was so scared to even leave the hostel to go to the police station. For days, Sherry's mom delivered her meals and tried to take care of her. She's like, it's okay, we can go to the police, it'll be fine. But of course, Frank

is pissed. He tracks down Sherry's mom and starts following her to the hostel and starts harassing the two to come back. He even starts posting in decent videos of Sherry everywhere, spreading it amongst their families, their friends, their social circles, everyone. Sherry's mom said, it was hard. It was like swinging on the edge of a cliff. I didn't know how to get up and Frank was there step by step

I mean it was scary. So they did everything that they could they found anyone who would listen and told them everything Now Sherry and her mom obviously the police didn't take anything seriously So Sherry starts sending mass text messages through we chat to share her story with anyone that would listen like this girl Is like I have nothing to lose are you freaking kidding me? So she used social media. Yes. She talked about how Frank is being protected by government officials, state officials,

the police, and they use his services to rape young women and girls. She told them about the cameras that were set up the way everything went down the room, the procedure of these government officials coming in and picking their victim and timing was really crucial. During this exact time, there was a nationwide crackdown in China on gang crimes. Now, even just a

whole operation was called Sao Hiei Chua. Sao Hiei Chua. Sao Hiei Chua, like your, yeah, against all the gangs and underground activities. Yeah, which you're like, okay, well that sounds nice, that sounds like every country you should do that, right? But it's controversial. Because when you're talking about gangs, it's not just gangs you're talking about. Gains don't grow to this size without help from the government, without help from moles

or without undercover officers. I mean, there's corrupt officials that are helping them get this big. So it's not really just looking into gangs. It's looking into the government. Corruption. Very powerful people. Yeah.

And so it goes hand in hand with corruption, which China is very sensitive to that. I mean, I guess everybody of government is, but the crackdown on corruption and the social media stir up of what was going on in the little red mansion led to Frank being arrested because you know these officials are thinking am I really gonna lose everything for this guy named Frank?

probably not so they say we can't protect you anymore your umbrella of protection has finally expired Frank and his colluding government officials and police officers were arrested Frank and 37 other people were found guilty of leading, participating in organized crimes, rape, sex trafficking, fraud, bribery, and corruption since at least 2004, and they were arrested in 2020. Wow, that's so recent. At first, keywords, at first, Frank was given the death penalty, and the other 37 defendants were given anywhere between 30 months to 20 years in prison. So you're like, okay, it kind of sounds like justice, right? Well, no, because the real scandal is just starting.

The first. Frank had insider help, he had support from the government officials. I mean, think about it, the crime itself is so ballsy. Frank is kidnapping, holding women hostage, sex trafficking, egg harvesting in the super busy city of Shanghai in 2020 where there's so much surveillance, so much CCTV, internet gossip, stories. I mean, the risk of getting caught is astronomical. But Frank even said so himself, so confidently, like the cocky bastard that he is, he said, there's nobody in Shanghai that I can't buy off.

And I guess he was right about that. I mean, how do we even know which officials helped him? Well, we have Frank to thank. He took detailed videos of each one of them having sex with traffic victims. And if they ever wanted to pull out, he would threaten to go public with these videos. And the officials that helped him, they got off easy.

Most of them were sentenced to less than two years in prison. I mean, this was a shocker. Are you kidding? Everyone was disgusted. But that's not all. Another freaking bombshell. Frank's death sentence was rescinded and instead he was given life with potential parole. That's not even the end.

The second scandal. Frank and the other government officials got nowhere near what they deserved. Meanwhile, the women got a long time, which I get it, okay? People like Lucy, Lucy was not for the girls, but in the end, she too was a victim. She was forced into this. She never wanted this for herself, but because she helped Frank traffic more women, she was giving, and a lot of these women were given anywhere between eight to twenty years. Longer than the government officials. Oh my gosh.

And those were not the only victims, because remember the children that Frank had? Yeah. Well, a lot of them came out to say that they too were abused. Frank would beat them to the point of them being bedridden for days at a time. Some of the kids said that they had to beg for food and water. I mean, most of the kids, they were never even registered because they were illegally had. So none of them could even attend school or receive any sort of health care or benefits. I feel for these kids, imagine born in that kind of environment, knowing that's how you are brought to the world. And now your mom is in prison for being a victim

and your dad is a monster. And I don't even know exactly how the mom will see the kid exactly because it's such a complex emotion. I also wonder how the kids see the mom because if they've gotten older to the point, I think that Frank definitely would have brainwashed them to a degree and put them up against them all. Now, the reason that this went viral is not just because it's such an insane case that people need to know about,

but it's because the initial articles about this case were silenced. So we both know the Red Mansion case of ag harvesting for sterilization assault sex trafficking to high powered government officials. I mean, we found out it's going on for a while for close to 20 years. Frank is the ultimate predator, and the bulk of it became public in 2020. But it wasn't until like a year later in late 2021 that news hit social media, which is odd because journalists are usually fighting to break explosive stories like this. It's all about who gets their hands on the juiciest details first. So China Business Journal publishes an article.

It was titled Uncovering the Secrets of Little Red House. It's Inside Stories Unimaginable. And within a few hours, the article was read more than 100 million times. It was explosive. Everyone is sending it to their friends and family, posting it, reposting it onto their social media accounts. They were captioning it things like, oh my god, this is pure disgusting.

I can't believe this. But then they would get flooded with text messages and DMs. Hey, I can't open the article that you sent me. I can't find it anywhere. Hey, what did you send me? The links not working. What? It seemed like the article had been completely wiped

from the internet, scrubbed clean. Justice was never on the victim's side. So now most of them are being sent to prison where they're being silenced and even online their stories are being silenced. It seems like everyone in power is just trying to sweep it under the rug. And I mean, it's pretty clear why? First of all, the public was just so shocked that something could happen like this in 2020. Why was the search on the house done so late? Why did nobody even bat a freaking eye? People who read the original article before it was deleted said this.

I initially thought it was just a sex trafficking case, but then I came to find out it's not that simple. There's just too many questions about officials shielding one another. The social grievances and so on, thinking that your back was leaning against a big tree only to find out that it's man-eating tiger. I'm slowly starting to understand what it means to speak out. This issue will probably be forgotten once again within a short period, but the memories of one person are the memories of millions. Another one wrote, how many red mansions are out there that we just don't know about? I mean how could this place exist for so long without us knowing? Another one wrote, How many red mansions are out there that we just don't know about? I mean, how could this place exist for so long without a snowing? Another one.

Those people can't be punished enough. This is too dark. The dark secrets will never be exposed because it's too dark. Think about it. The woman who allegedly cut her own tubes, Lucy, she was sentenced to 14 years and six months that exceeds the sentences of the officials that were shielding Frank. Combined.

She said, let's ask this question. What's more unimaginable that these women have gone through hell and they thought they're finally freed from Frank's control and don't have to be tortured again? However, they're all sentenced to prison and have no idea when they'll see sunlight. Or the fact that everyone's trying to sweep this under the rock. And that is the story of the Little Red Mansion. Whoever's involved and whoever's even not involved seems like they just want to sweep it under the rock.

But it doesn't look like it's going to stay that way. Because how many dead bodies can you sweep under a rug before you have a mountain? A mound of secrets that are unavoidable. I mean, eventually, people are going to peel back the carpet. How are you going to hide that? And eventually people are going to peel back the carpet. How are you gonna hide that? And that is this week's mini-sode. I...

Hope you guys are okay after this episode because this one my blood was boiling the amount of anger and hatred, the corruption, the... how many people are in on it? The fact that these women were sentenced to longer than these government officials that helped Frank traffic human beings. I don't know if I'll ever get over that. Let me know your thoughts and stay safe out there. And I will see you guys on Wednesday for the main episode. Bye.