Crime | Shop owner detained over HDK2 million bounced cheque

A 59-year-old local man, the owner of an eatery located in the ZAPE area, has been detained by the Judiciary Police (PJ) for having issued a HKD2 million bank cheque from an account that did not have sufficient funds, a PJ spokesperson announced yesterday during the regular police forces press conference.
According to the PJ, the case dates back to early 2020, when the man borrowed HKD2 million from a friend after experiencing unexpected difficulties.
At the time, he promised to return the money within three months but as time passed, he kept making excuses to delay the repayment.
In September 2020, the man who lent him the money went to his eatery and requested the repayment of the HKD2 million.
The suspect then agreed to give him a bank cheque for the full amount with the condition that he would date it December 30.
In early January this year, the victim unintentionally passed by the street where the eatery was once located and realized that the shop was now closed and empty.
The next day, he attempted to bank the cheque, but the bank dishonored the cheque for a supposed lack of funds.
A complaint was consequently filed with the PJ for the criminal offense of issuing a dishonored cheque.
On June 25, the suspect was detained by the Public Security Police Force while attempting to leave Macau at the Border Gate checkpoint. He was then handed over to the PJ for further investigation.
Under questioning from the PJ, he admitted to having issued a cheque from a bank account that had insufficient funds, claiming that he did so in an attempt to buy himself some time so as to obtain the money that he owed. However, he was unable to do so.
He was presented to the Public Prosecutions Office on June 26 to be charged with the crime of issuing a dishonored cheque.

Domestic helper caught after pawning employers’ jewelry

A 38-year-old woman from Indonesia, working as a domestic helper in the home of a local family, has been arrested by the Judiciary Police (PJ) for having pawned or sold a significant number of jewelry items stolen from her employers, PJ informed yesterday.
The case was first discovered on June 25 when the couple that employed the suspect conducted some cleaning around their house and realized that a large number of jewelry items, normally kept in a specific bag, were missing.
They immediately suspected the helper and filed a complaint to the PJ.
After investigation, the suspect admitted to the PJ that she took several pieces of jewelry from her employers’ home as well as from the house of her employer’s elderly father, where she would occasionally go to clean.
The PJ found that she had pawned various pieces of jewelry in local pawnshops on at least 36 different occasions over the last year.
The woman told the PJ that she transferred the money she made from pawning the jewelry to a bank account in Indonesia.
She also admitted to having acquired cheap items that looked similar to some of the stolen pieces which she mixed alongside the rest of the jewelry in an attempt to conceal her theft.
According to the PJ, the stolen items were valued at about 200,000 patacas in total. Of this, 120,000 patacas account for the pieces stolen at her employers’ home and 80,000 patacas from the employer’s father’s house.
The PJ found 11 of the jewelry items in local pawnshops. RM