Yang Yongmeng, the man who made up the whole "AIDS prostitute" event in north China was detained by police, local sources said on Friday.

He was taken away from the Xuanwu district in Beijing by police from Rongcheng County of Hebei Province, for suspected slander.

Police found that Yang, born in August 1976, was a native of Beijing and married. He had been detained by police in Beijing for 15 days in 1992 for theft.

Yang met Yan Deli from a village in the northern province of Hebei in March 2008. They soon became lovers and lived together.

In this past June, Yan wanted to break up with Yang but the request was rejected by the latter. The man bought laptop computer, printer and laminating machine in August, printing their photos with vitriols to distribute in Rongcheng, Yan's hometown. He also sent cellphone multimedia messages to Yan's acquaintances.

Yang opened blogs on portal websites like Sina.com and QQ.com at the end of August in Yan's name, fabricating that she had been raped by her stepfather and was now HIV-positive.

He said under Yan's name that she was spreading the HIV virus to new clients each day and wanted to seek fame even by the questionable means of attracting public attention on the Internet.

He publicized 279 mobile phone numbers he found from Yan and her elder brother's mobile phones, saying that they were "clients" of the "AIDS-infected prostitute".

Yang also made some pornographic vedio clips and uploaded, police said.

Yan's relatives had two disputes with Yang. Once Yang asked cellphone numbers of the policemen helping with intermediation and included them onto the list of "Yan's clients".

At Yan's request, the disease control and prevention center (CDC) in Rongcheng county, that of the Baoding city and the national CDC conducted three check-ups. Three test results also showed she wasn't infected with HIV.

Police said that Yang made up the facts to distribute defamatory pictures, articles and video clips which brought "tremendous mental hurt" to Yan Deli and resulted in "extremely bad social effect".

Police also called on media to protect the privacy of Yan and her relatives, in order not to deepen the wound left to them.

"Yan Deli" was the target of vitriol last week, but condemnation soon turned to sympathy and support after netizens found the case a hoax.