CRIME | Romanian man nabbed for withdrawing cash with doctored cards

The Judiciary Police (PJ) arrested a Romanian man on Tuesday for illegally withdrawing money through forged credit cards after bank surveillance footage captured the illicit act.
The suspect, a 35-year-old car cleaner, allegedly used at least 18 doctored cards on Sunday and Tuesday at three banks’ ATM machines in the central district of the Macau peninsula in a bid to cash out money, said Chan Cho Man, acting head of PJ’s economic crimes division.
His multiple attempts, only ten of which were successful, resulted in the withdrawal of MOP13,000 in cash. He later converted his gains into US dollars and Euros. It remains unclear whether or not the foreign man, who entered the territory from Thailand, was employed by a syndicate and which destination he would next head to after the theft.
The incident surfaced after one of the banks compromised found one of the suspect’s bogus cards, which the authorities claimed had information stemming from Europe, stuck inside an ATM machine. The bank executives then reported the case to the police.
The PJ investigators caught the suspect in a downtown hotel on Tuesday night and uncovered related cash, only two credit cards and a laptop, which they found had been installed with software related to the cards. The police inquiry into the case is still underway.