A high school male student in the north-central Vietnamese province of Nghe An allegedly caused a neighboring five-year-old boy to die in a forest area while the teen was copying a video game.

D.N.H., an 11th grader at Quynh Luu 4 High School in Nghe An’s Quynh Luu District, was summoned by the provincial police on Tuesday morning for an investigation into the death of H.T.V.D., 5, who is one of H.’s neighbors in Quynh Luu’s Quynh Tam Commune.

D. had gone missing since the afternoon of Sunday last week before his body was found on late Tuesday afternoon some ten kilometers away from his house in a forest far away from residential areas in Lang Thanh Commune, located in Yen Thanh District.

D.’s family said that the boy had asked his father to go play with his neighbors on Sunday afternoon.

According to footage from security cameras, H. was the last person seen with D. before his disappearance.

H. initially admitted to the police that he had copied an online game by intentionally hiding D. away so that he can bring the little boy home as a ‘hero’ who finds and saves the child.

However, as D.’s family and functional forces began searching for the boy, H. became scared of continuing his ‘hero’ plan and left the five-year-old alone in the forest.

People search for a missing five-year-old boy in Quynh Luu District, Nghe An Province, Vietnam in this photo taken on June 8, 2020. Photo: Hoang Nha / Tuoi Tre

After being summoned, H. led the authorities to the area where the boy had been hidden, where D. was found already dead with his hands tied.

Autopsy results showed that there were no signs of either murder or wound on D.’s body.

The cause of the boy’s death was determined as prolonged food and water deprivation.

According to H.’s homeroom teacher at Quynh Luu 4 High School, H. was transferred to his current school from Nguyen Duc Mau High School in the same district in 2019.

The teacher assessed that H. is quite sociable with his friends at school, showing no signs of being a defiant student.

However, H. has exhibited signs of video game addiction, according to the teacher, adding that H. still went to school as usual on Monday and Tuesday.

The People's Committee of Quynh Tam Commune has provided support to D.'s family for the boy’s burial service.

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