A 15-year-old purportedly confessed to murdering the girl to sell her earrings for money to buy time at a local internet cafe.
Mong The Xuong, a 15-year-old from Vietnam, killed seven-year-old Anh Nhu by beating her to death with a rock. Purportedly, he confessed to doing so in order to sell her earrings for money to play popular MMO Vo Lam Truyen Ky (Swordsman Online) at a local internet cafe he frequented. He later cut the earrings up and hid them under his bed.
Elizabeth Woolley, who founded gaming addiction help group Online Gamers Anonymous after her son committed suicide due to videogame addiction, is claiming it’s time governments regulated excessive videogame use.
“It’s exactly like drugs or alcohol – once people get addicted, they feel they have to have it. There are always certain people who will get addicted to a drug, and in gaming we estimate it’s about 20% to 30% of people,” claimed Woolley.
A spokesman for the Association of UK Interactive Entertainment responded, saying that “[t]here is currently no proven link between video games and addiction, with there being mixed opinion among academics about whether a game can be clinically addictive. […]
“UKIE is aware of some individuals that play games excessively but often the causes of many of the unfortunate cases that we hear about are down to other underlying medical, social or environmental issues concerning the individuals concerned.”
Source: Sky News, via Yahoo! News UK
