Crime | ‘Ghost riders’ finally caught

The Judiciary Police (PJ) have finally identified and detained two suspects for a strange case involving the disappearance and reappearance of a motorcycle, a PJ spokesperson revealed yesterday during the regular joint press conference of the police forces held at the PJ headquarters.
The case was initially reported to the Public Security Police Force (PSP) in May when a motorcycle owner discovered that his motorcycle, parked at Rua da Tribuna in the Northern district, had disappeared, suspecting it to be stolen.
After making his report to the PSP, the owner of the motorcycle found the vehicle parked where he had left it before its disappearance, and he dropped the case.
On June 7, the same owner once again realized that the motorcycle had disappeared and called a friend, who is a PJ officer, to help him search for it.
Later that same night the two people spotted two teenagers riding the motorcycle in the area and decided to observe them.
A few minutes later they parked the motorcycle in the street parking and the rider was spotted removing a key from the ignition and placing it in his pocket.
The victim and the friend then decided to step forward and approach them with the PJ officer identifying himself as a police officer.
The two suspects, both 17-year-old and school colleagues, were taken in for questioning. The rider confessed that in May he had seen the motorcycle parked on the street with the key in the ignition so he took the key and kept it. He then invited his colleague to ride along with him on the motorcycle around the city, after which he parked the motorcycle in the same place, in the hope that the owner would not have noticed that it had been missing for some time.
The second suspect confirmed the story and also admitted to being aware that they were taking a motorcycle from someone without his permission.
The PJ also found that the suspect, who admitted to riding the motorcycle on at least two occasions, does not possess a driving license.
They were presented to the Public Prosecutions Office on June 9 to be charged with vehicle theft and use of the stolen vehicle.

Resident scammed over
hiring sex services online
A 41-year-old Macau resident has reportedly been scammed while attempting to procure the services of an alleged prostitute he had met through a mobile phone application, the PJ reported.
After chatting with the alleged woman, the man was asked to pay the amount of 500 patacas using a points card (My Card) that he acquired from a convenience store.
After sending a photo of the card code via the same app, the man began receiving calls from two men who threatened him to pay significantly more money than the sum he had agreed to.
After several calls, in which threats to his life and his family members were made, the man gave in and acquired a total of 17,000 patacas of the same cards, sending the corresponding codes to the woman as instructed by the men blackmailing him.
However, as the calls did not subsequently stop, and he had begun to fear for his safety, he decided to finally go to the police and file a complaint about the scam.
He reported having lost a total of 17,500 patacas.
As reported by the PJ on several occasions, this type of scam has been very popular in the past few years and has accounted for the loss of huge sums of money from both locals and tourists.