A woman who was held captive by her extramarital partner in Ho Chi Minh City on Friday turned out to have voluntarily agreed to stay with the captor to extort money from her real husband, police announced late the same day.

It took officers from the District 12 police unit and a special flying squad more than eight hours to rescue a woman–who was only identified as P.T.C.–from the rented house she shares with the captor, Le Van Tuan, on Friday afternoon.

Tuan, who is married and has two children, kept his mistress behind closed door following what witnesses said was a fierce row over money issues since early morning.

The man refused repeated orders from police to release the hostage, while threatened to detonate a gas cylinder to drive away officers.

The captor was only captured after police opened fire and stormed in the house in late afternoon.

While it was previously reported that Tuan wanted to hold hostage to have money to buy drug, police told reporters at a media meeting after catching the 31-year-old man that everything was arranged by the captor and his paramour.

Tuan is a methamphetamine addict and has been cohabitating with C., 37, since early this year, according to police.

The unmarried couple are loan sharks, or those that offer loans at extremely high interest rates, officers said.

“As their borrowers have defaulted on their loans, the couple intended to borrow money from T., who is C.’s legal husband, to continue their business,” Nguyen Quoc Hai, deputy chief of the District 12 police unit, told reporters.

After keeping his extramarital partner inside the house, Tuan demanded that T. apology to him because he once called him “a drug addict,” Hai said.

“C. voluntarily agreed to stay in the house with Tuan, so there were no kidnapping or hostage taking here,” the police officer asserted.

While the incident occurred at 7 am, it was not until 2:40 pm when the captor was arrested.

“At first we did not know what Tuan was doing with C. inside the house, so we did not take any action but persuaded him to ensure safety for the woman and himself,” Hai explained.

When T., the woman’s real husband, came at the scene to apology to Tuan, the captor asked him to lend him VND20 million (US$941).

When replied that T. only has VND10 million, Tuan said the sum is only “enough to buy two caskets,” which frightened T. that his wife could be harmed.

At 1:50 pm, T. came back with VND20 million, but after receiving the money, Tuan and C. remained inside the house.

Seeing that their persuasion was useless, District 12 police called on the Ho Chi Minh City Police Department for help, and were eventually reinforced with 20 officers from a special flying squad.

These officers fired tear gas into the closed house, broke down the door, and stormed in to capture Tuan and free his unmarried partner.

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