Local man scammed over ‘industrial visas’

A local man has reportedly been scammed out of RMB137,000 by a non-resident worker from the mainland employed in a watch shop in Macau, the Judiciary Police (PJ) informed yesterday during the regular joint police press conference.

The victim reportedly knew the suspect from the watch shop, where the two men often talked.

In one of his visits to the store, the victim told the suspect that a friend of his on the mainland wanted to visit Macau, but had been unable to obtain a tourist visa.

The suspect then said that he knew someone in the neighboring city of Shenzhen who owned a large construction company. He said that this company had two unused quotas for an “industrial visa” which would allow mainland residents to enter Macau for commercial and business activities.

He also told the local man that his friend was asking for RMB36,000 in compensation for each of these visas.

The victim agreed to have the two quotas filled, and he was asked to pay 70% of the sum (RMB50,400) in advance, with the remaining 30% to be paid when the visas were ready.

The suspect also told the victim that it would take about 15 days to process the applications.

He also told the victim that, through this friend in Shenzhen, he had discovered an investment opportunity in the construction of a large-scale tourism resort in Sanya, Hainan, and asked the victim if he was interested in investing in the project.

After the two weeks, the suspect informed the victim that the visas were ready, and sent him a photo of the purported visas, asking for the payment of the remaining 30%. The local man paid the sum, also adding some extra money for the spurious investment in the Hainan resort.

Later the victim contacted his friends who were waiting for the visas on the mainland, but they said that they hadn’t received visas from anyone. The victim then attempted to contact the salesman, but found that he had been deleted and blocked from his contacts.

After the complaint was filed with the PJ, the PJ opened an investigation and called for help from the Interpol delegation in China to investigate the alleged visas.

According to the information received, this visa type does not exist and the suspect had been lying from the start.

On returning to Macau on March 21, the suspect was detained by police and taken into questioning.

He admitted to having lied about the visas as well as the investment in Hainan, saying that he had taken the victim’s money to the casino.

The police also discovered the WeChat conversation between the two men on the suspect’s phone, substantiating the local man’s accusation. The victim claims to have been defrauded of RMB137,000 in total.