Kidnappers Demand $36.5M for Rich Guy's Mother-in-Law

Criminals hoping for a share of Bernie Ecclestone's fortune have reportedly kidnapped the racing billionaire's mother-in-law in Brazil. Local media say the criminals, in touch with the 85-year-old Formula One head, are demanding $36.5 million—the highest ransom ever in a Brazilian kidnapping, per the Telegraph. The BBC reports 67-year-old Aparecida Schunck was seized near her Sao Paulo home on Friday. Police and Ecclestone have yet to comment.

Schunck is the mother of Ecclestone's 38-year-old wife, Fabiana Flosi, whom Ecclestone married in 2012. That same year, a man was jailed for threatening to abduct one of Ecclestone's daughters if he wasn't paid $262,500, reports ESPN; Ecclestone, one of the UK's richest men, is worth an estimated $3.1 billion. Similar demands were once made daily in Brazil—there were 321 kidnappings in Sao Paolo alone in 2002—but are now less common due to a police anti-kidnap division, reports Reuters. (Read more Brazil stories.)