Crime | Taxi driver charged for trapping passengers inside car

A  taxi driver has been charged for depriving people of their physical freedom, the Public Security Police Force (PSP) announced during a press conference held yesterday.

The 35-year-old male driver, surnamed Wong, is a Macau resident.

At 10 p.m., last Saturday, he picked up two passengers near a hotel located in Cotai. The two passengers asked the driver to take them to another hotel, also located in Cotai.

After driving for a short time, the taxi driver parked the vehicle near the Avenida de Cotai, got out of the car, locked it and left. The two passengers then tried to open the door, but failed, at which point they called the police for help.

When the PSP arrived on the scene, the two passengers were removed from the taxi. By then, the taxi driver had returned to the scene.

PSP took the driver to a police station, where he admitted that he locked the passengers inside the taxi.

Wong told the police that he did it because he deemed the distance between the pick-up and the drop-
off locations to be too short.

Wong said that he had told the passengers to take another taxi before he carried them in his own, but that the passengers did not comply with his suggestion. Wong, being angry with the passengers, chose to lock them in the car.

Phone frauds – The PSP received another report of a phone fraud in which the criminals pretended to be officers from the Pac On Immigration Department. However, no theft has been reported this time.

Last Friday, a male Macau resident  received a phone call from the “Pac On Immigration Department”, which questioned him on whether he had assisted other people in obtaining documents.

The resident, during his talk with the “immigration department” deemed that it could be a fraudulent call and decided to report the case to the police.

According to a PSP announcement made yesterday, since March 14 until 9 a.m. yesterday, the police authority received reports regarding similar frauds from 164 people.

Nineteen people claimed to have suffered financial losses, with the money involved amounting to MOP11.44 million.

Jewels robbery – A 30-year-old Filipino domestic helper has been arrested for stealing from a jewelry shop that belongs to her employer.

Last Friday, the jewelry shop, located in the central district, reported to the police that some items worth HKD48,000 had been stolen from the premises.

The police, after reviewing the CCTV records of the shop, found that it had been the domestic helper of the person in charge of that shop who had stolen the items.

The police then found the jewelry in the suspect’s room at her employer’s house. The suspect admitted to the crime.