Armed with sunglasses, binoculars and camcorders, China's first all-female detective agency has declared war on wife beaters and unfaithful husbands.
Although the 25 private eyes of the Women's Rights Protection Investigation Center, based in southwestern China's Chengdu city, only started business this spring, they have already placed the first abusive male behind bars.
"The guy beat up his wife routinely, and eventually put her in hospital for more than 10 days with three broken ribs," said Yan Guoqiong, 38, the center's executive director.
"He got a year in jail. I feel a certain sense of achievement whenever we can help other women escape from this kind of torture."
The investigation center's Web site sports an image of Sherlock Holmes and there is an undeniable detective novel flavor to the way it operates.
When teams from the center set out, sometimes in the middle of the night, they may put on wigs or dress up like ethnic minorities, in order, they say, to protect their anonymity.
But there is nothing fictitious about the consequences for the men found to be breaking the written and unwritten rules of marital conduct.
The agency's investigations
frequently end when its detectives burst into hotel rooms or rented apartments for the final decisive piece of evidence, catching married men with their mistresses.
"We took these pictures last night," said Liu Xiaolin, a lawyer with the center, proudly displaying photos of a none-too-happy-looking man in his 30s, stark naked in a sea of ruffled bed sheets. "His wife can use them in court."
Another married woman will soon be able to show the judge footage, taken by the center's detectives, of her husband and an apparently much younger woman in a hot late-night encounter at a park.
"Stop it right there," Liu told a secretary playing the recording on her computer screen, as the face of the woman suddenly came into full view. "That's an excellent shot."
However, most of its detectives carry their own memories of private tragedies and are often motivated by them.
Yan, the center's director, knows from her own bitter experience what it means to be at the mercy of an unfeeling husband.
Ten years ago, with a fresh university degree in economics, she married and planned to start a family, until she realized her husband was keeping a mistress out of town.
"This really hurt me and I decided to stand up for my rights," she said, describing how she collected evidence about his affair, and used it to file successfully for divorce.
This was not so much the end of a sad personal chapter, as it was the beginning of what was to become her life's mission.
"Soon I discovered that many other women had similar problems," she said. "It got me thinking about the rights of women and I decided to help them."
Many have appreciated Yan's assistance so much that they have decided to follow in her footsteps and they now make up the majority of the staff in the newly opened detective agency.
The agency has had a busy few months since it was established, and it is not unusual for it to get more than 10 calls from women in one day, desperate for help and advice.
It reflects the massive expansion of wealth in China, allowing large numbers of newly-rich males to resume an old tradition of concubinage, installing young women in expensive apartments and indulging them in their costly habits.
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