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Peruvian Transsexual Surprises Kidnappers

A former police officer and a friend got a surprise when the Peruvian woman they thought they were kidnapping on a Moscow street turned out to be a pre-operative transsexual.

The 30-year-old Peruvian, identified by police as Ronald Victor Garcia Barbosa, was hailing a taxi on Kalanchyovskaya Ulitsa in central Moscow early Tuesday after attending a transvestite party in a nearby nightclub, the Regnum news agency reported Thursday, citing Moscow police.

Barbosa looked very much a woman, with silicone beast implants and feminine attire, police said.

A Lada hatchback stopped, and two men -- one of them in police uniform -- forced Barbosa inside and drove away. A passer-by who saw the abduction called police and reported the car's license plate numbers.

In the car, the abductors demanded $10,000 from Barbosa and, when she refused to pay, began beating her, police said. The Peruvian managed to leap out of the moving car once it was outside Moscow, and she fled.

Police arrested the suspected kidnappers in northern Moscow on Wednesday, RIA-Novosti reported. One of them, Igor Dmitrov, 25, left the Kursk city police force two months ago. His friend, Alexander Cherednichenko, 28, is also a native of Kursk. If charged and convicted of abduction and extortion, they face up to 15 years in prison.

Police suspect that the two had been kidnapping and extorting money from prostitutes and pimps in Moscow for several weeks before Tuesday's incident.

Audacious criminal assaults, including kidnappings, against foreigners are not unheard of in Moscow. In October 2004, a group of natives of the North Caucasus forced an Israeli businessman into their Nexia sedan near Tverskaya Ulitsa, but were intercepted by police on Ryazansky Prospekt four hours later as they tried to leave Moscow.

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