Guys, Otto never tried to steal a stupid poster.

The story about a deal for a $10,000 used car and a church donating $200,000 is only from North Korea's forced confession. The poster was located on a staff only floor which means he had to gain access to that floor, remove the large poster, sneak it back up to his room where he needed to hide it, and get it to the airport unnoticed, not plan on a bag search and then it also means he had to have been all alone without his minder watching him the second he left the door of his room. You don't see his face in the shitty cctv footage of it despite the entire hotel undoubtedly full of cameras and microphones, and the rest of the evidence is just as set up. He has no choice but to do what they say since the alternative is death

North Korea realized this was a young American kid, traveling alone, who they could easily set up, and since it creates poster is almost guaranteed to serve to justify their reasons behind taking him as a hostage.

Honestly the arrest was probably because North Korea likes to have hostages on hand as bargaining chips for when they need aid from the UN to deal with famine, flooding, and ect. The North Koreans saw this young American as a perfect opportunity for them to have an opening move to any disaster relief aid they might need in the future. By having a young American kid in their custody the North Koreans knows the UN will come to them and offer aid for their people in exchange for the hostages. This makes North Korea see as though the entire U.N. offered these supplies for nothing at all.

This allows North Korea to appear as though the U.N. bowed to the will of their dear leader by giving food and medicine. The trade of hostages is left out of their public version and since these people are in "labor camps", but Otto did't have any signs of hard labor, and seems to have been well nourished. What North Korea didn't expect was for his to have a heart attach