Scams continue to make victims of tourists and residents alike

A series of swindles over the weekend added to the high incidence of crimes involving scams in Macau, this time hitting tourists and residents alike.

Several cases were presented yesterday at a Judiciary Police (PJ) press conference, among them two involving fraudulent currency exchange schemes, a recurrent scam in the past few months.

In the first case, a 43-year-old resident of mainland China is suspected of having swindled another man also from China.

The case reached the PJ through the force hotline, 993, on January 10 after the victim tried to exchange money with the suspect.

The deal involved an exchange of RMB168,400 for HKD200,000 but after the remittance made by the victim to an account in the mainland, the suspect fled the scene without exchanging the promised HKD.

On the following day, the PJ managed to locate and intercept the suspect who denied the accusations and refused to reply to any of the PJ’s questions. However, the police force said it found sufficient evidence in the possession of the suspect leading them to conclude that the swindle had occurred. The suspect was sent to the Public Prosecutions Office for further proceedings.

In the second case, the PJ received a complaint from a 23-year-old man from mainland China that accused three other men of theft.

The victim claimed to have approached one of the men and offered to exchange for him a total of HKD100,000. The man accepted and told the victim to proceed to a certain room in a Cotai hotel, which he did. Arriving at the room, the victim told the PJ that two other men were waiting to assault him as soon as he entered, kicking, pushing and threatening him with knives.

Fearing for his life, the victim said that he did not resist nor prevent the attackers from taking his bag and its contents, which included personal documents, a mobile phone and HKD51,000 in cash.
The victim then had his wrists, ankles and mouth bound with duct tape to prevent him from seeking assistance. Over the course of the next hour, the victim was able to release himself, escape from the room and seek help from an on-duty police officer stationed in the vicinity of the hotel’s casino.

The police say they are also questioning the victim in regards to the fact that he was carrying significantly less money in his possession than what he had offered the attackers.

In a separate case a 29-year- old male local resident reported a swindle that started with a phone call from an unknown person who claimed to know the victim and asked him to save the scammer’s new phone number.

Several days later, the victim received a call from the scammer who claimed to be in custody in China after he had been arrested in an anti-prostitution case. The swindler requested RMB6,000 be wired to him to post the bail, then another RMB6,000 for the bail of his friend, and finally an additional RMB10,000 with the justification that the prostitute were underage.

When the victim tried to redial the number, he was informed that it had been disconnected, leading him to present the complaint to the PJ.