Four rural mutual financial cooperatives in a small county in East China became the victims of a more than 110 million yuan ($17.6 million) fraud.

Eight of the eleven suspects are now in police custody, the publicity department of Guannan county in Jiangsu province's Lianyungang said on Tuesday.

The department also said that the four grassroots financial organizations, which are designed to give small loans to farmers, had instead used the savings of about 2,500 people to take a chance on a high risk investment.