According to a timeline from Daines' office, negotiations for the UM student's release began on July 18, a day after he was sent to the detention center that his mother had described as "one of the worst in China.''

Guthrie McLean said he had no idea what was being done while he was being detained. He said police at the detention center told him he was going to jail because there was no proof the driver had hurt his mother, but the driver had injuries. He said the experience wasn’t typical of his life in China.

“This incident was done as part of the actions of a taxi driver and a few old-fashioned thinking police officers,” Guthrie McLean said.

He thought he was being lied to by everyone and was always worried he was going to say something that would get him into more trouble.

“You can start to get creepy paranoid,” Jennifer McLean said.

Aside from interrogations by the police, Guthrie McLean said the detention center had about the same accommodations someone would find while camping. There was a shower and toilet in one room and a deck where the people detained could sleep. He and about 20 others were held in the room together.