Yuan was smuggled into the country from China on August 25, 1998. She used a genuine Thai passport and posed as the niece of her smuggler, Chaichana Klaharn, a Thai citizen. They were caught at Dulles International Airport. Yuan could not speak English or Thai. Through a Mandarin Chinese translator, she told immigration authorities she was from Fuzhou in the Chinese province of Fujian, and her parents had paid Klaharn money to take her to the United States. He said he was supposed to deliver Yuan to a hotel in Washington D.C. Klaharn pleaded guilty to passport fraud in September 1998 and was sentenced to four months in jail. Yuan was sent to live with a foster family in Alexandria, Virginia, while authorities decided what to do with her. Yuan was last seen exiting a Fairfax County school bus at approximately 3:00 p.m. The bus was near Lincolnia Road and Deming Avenue in Virginia at the time.