Villages in the Bolivian Amazon jungle punished two motorbike thieves by tying them to a tree swarming with poisonous fire ants.
Authorities in Ayopaya claims that the two teenage thieves, aged 18 and 19, nearly died after being stung hundreds of times by the ants, with one needing dialysis for kidney failure, according to the Mirror.
The men were reportedly only freed from their torture when the families of the two thieves paid a ransom of around £2,200, which the villagers described as compensation for the loss of their motorbikes.
Fire ants is a generic name, in this case referring to the pseudomyrmex triplarinus ants, which has a symbiotic relationship with the triplaris tree in South America, protecting it against predation, with the two thieves treated as intruders repeatedly stung by the ants’ alkaloid venom.
