Zhengzhou - "I was abducted by someone and the pain in my heart will last a lifetime! It's so hard to talk about " wrote Yang Xiaolong (not his real name) on his Tencent QQ, a popular instant messaging platform in China.

The 15-year-old from Xinmi, Henan province, fell victim to a rare case of same-gender sexual assault on the night of June 8, when 29-year-old Li Mu, the suspect, allegedly dragged him into his car at knifepoint and "raped" him in a nearby mountain area. The boy was held captive for six hours, and was not released until 5 am the next morning.

Huge controversies arose when reports said the local police, who claimed they could not find laws relating to forcible sex between people of the same gender, decided to put the suspect, who was detained on June 19, into administrative detention for only 15 days, a much lighter punishment designed for those guilty of misdemeanors.

According to Article 236 of China's Criminal Law, only women are defined as victims in the crime of rape, while the crime of coercive indecency toward children in article 237 does not define the age of a child and only juveniles under 14 are regarded as children in judicial practice.

"The police told me that despite the vile nature of the crime they could only detain the suspect for 'acting indecently toward other people', according to the relevant laws," said Jin Hongbing, Yang Xiaolong's uncle, who bought a law book, exhausted himself searching for relevant laws online and consulted several lawyers after the attack on his nephew, in an attempt to ensure the suspect received a heavier punishment.

"We could find no similar file cases and didn't know where to start," said Wei Wei, a spokesperson with Xinmi police. "Such a case is rare in China, so we dealt with it very cautiously."

According to Wei, the police sought instructions from higher authorities and held meetings with prosecutors to define the nature of the crime but received "quite different opinions".