Five officers were injured and property was damaged during the mob's raid, reported the Xin'an Evening News, based in the provincial capital Hefei.

On Friday, a group of people engaged in a pyramid sales beat Wu Zhuangyuan, a secondary school student from Chongqing in southwest China, and pushed him into a lake in downtown Wuhu, the report said.

Wu had been lured to Wuhu to join the cosmetics sales network. Officers arrived and rescued Wu.

The case led policemen to an underground store, where they detained the network's leader Guo Quanmin and more than 20 members, the newspaper said. The members reportedly were also lured to the city from across the country by Guo but couldn't leave as Guo took away their property.

At noon, Wu Zhuangyuan was leaving the Helu Police Station when several members of the pyramid sales network beat him again. Two policemen stopped the beating and caught one of the attackers, the report said.

Shortly afterward, about 100 members of the illegal sales network stormed the police station.