Kidnappings have become a cottage industry in many countries. Some are conducted by disorganized criminals conducting random roadside abductions. Others are far more sophisticated and entail everything from assailants posing as local police officers to surveillance being gathered on potential targets far in advance of an actual abduction. A ransom exchange or revenge killing between gangs is often the motive, but there have also been reports that black-market organ harvesting, sex trafficking, and ritualistic killings are also involved.
Even if you’re an upstanding individual with no involvement in the criminal under-world, this doesn’t guarantee your safety. A victims’ chances of survival decrease with each passing moment, while the severity of their incarceration is simultaneously increasing. If you’re alone in a country widely known to have rampant kidnappings and you only have a moderate understanding of the language and geography, do you have a plan on what to do if you manage to escape captivity?
The Scenario:
SITUATION TYPE
Escape from a kidnapping
YOUR CREW
Yourself
LOCATION
Central America
SEASON
Fall
WEATHER
Humid; high 88 degrees F, low 63 degrees F
The Setup: You decide to take a two-week motorcycle trip from Southern California down through Central America to go sightseeing, sleep out under the stars, and periodically stay in hotels when the situation calls for it. Although you don’t have any acquaintances down that way, you have enough understanding of the language and local customs that you feel you’ll be able to travel safely. You bring your passport, your driver’s license, a sleeping bag and tent, water and snacks, a cell phone with prepaid SIM card, a few changes of clothing, and enough cash to hold you over for the trip. You know that gangs, cartels, and corrupt police can be a problem in this region of the world, but you have a map with the bad areas marked off so you know where not to travel. Overall, you expect your contact with locals will only be for food, lodging, directions, or other local accommodations.
The Complication: While riding down a long stretch of highway during your fourth day of travel, you continue to head south. Late one afternoon, you see two vehicles quickly approaching behind you. You figure it’s just locals looking to pass, so you pull into the right lane. As the first vehicle passes, it swerves in front of you and quickly brakes to the point you skid into his rear bumper. The other vehicle stops only about a car-length behind you. Two masked men emerge from the lead vehicle with pistols, snatch your keys from the ignition, and order you to the ground. The individuals in the other vehicle seem to be acting as security, watching behind them to see if anyone’s coming. Since there is no one else around, and you’re clearly surrounded and outgunned, you realize that attempting to fight or flee right now is likely to get you killed. You decide to cooperate, at least until an opportunity to escape arises. You hope these are just local thugs looking to steal your belongings and leave you on the roadside.
One of the assailants puts his knee on your neck while the other vigorously searches you head to toe. He finds and destroys your phone with the heel of his boot and also removes both your shoes. He empties your pockets and orders you into the trunk of the vehicle at gunpoint. You realize the situation has gotten much worse, but feel you have no alternative but to acquiesce to the commands. After about a 30-minute car ride in the dark, which you can tell is traveling over both paved and dirt roads, you suddenly stop. After being pulled from the trunk, you see you are now at an isolated home somewhere remote. It doesn’t appear to be in the vicinity of any other homes, and you count a total of five men in the two vehicles you were confronted by. They do not vocalize anything that helps you understand their intentions. You’re brought into what appears to be a smaller house behind the main house. As you enter, the building is sparse, with nothing more than a bucket and small tattered mattress in the corner.
As one of your captors handcuffs your left wrist to a pipe on the wall, you realize you’ve been kidnapped by individuals who may or may not be cartel-affiliated, but they’re definitely in the business of doing this regularly. You know the longer you wait, the more severe your level of incarceration will become, potentially culminating in your death. After about 45 minutes, the sun has gone down and you
