Two men from the mainland robbed an illegal currency exchange dealer of HK$300,000 in a hotel guestroom in Cotai on Sunday, after which one of them was arrested in Macau while the other was caught in Zhuhai the next day, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Chao Teng Hin said during a special press conference yesterday.
Chao identified the suspect arrested in Macau as a 41-year-old surnamed Cai and his accomplice caught in Zhuhai as a 37-year-old surnamed Zhang.
The robbery victim, also from the mainland, illegally engaged in currency exchange activities in local casinos.
On Sunday night, Chao said, Zhang contacted the male victim via an instant messaging app where they struck a currency exchange deal according to which the victim was to exchange yuan into HK$300,000 for Zhang. The victim agreed to go to a hotel guestroom in Cotai to meet Zhang to carry out the transaction.
After the victim entered the guestroom, Zhang and his accomplice, Cai, chatted with him for a while, during which the duo suddenly robbed him of the HK$300,000 cash that he had taken to the room with him for the transaction, and then fled the scene.
The victim reported the case to the police, after which PJ officers identified the two robbers and confirmed that they quickly fled to the mainland via the Macau-Zhuhai checkpoint of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge (HZMB), Chao said.
The Judiciary Police contacted their mainland counterparts asking them to look for the duo, after which the mainland police caught Zhang at the airport in Zhuhai at noon on Monday when he was about to catch a flight, while Cai was intercepted on Monday night when he was re-entering Macau via the HZMB Macau-Zhuhai checkpoint.
According to Chao, the duo had split the ill-gotten money equally between them.
The Judiciary Police have meanwhile launched an investigation into the robbery victim’s suspected illegal currency exchange activities, Chao said.
Judiciary Police (PJ) officers escort the hooded robbery suspect arrested in Macau to a PJ van outside the PJ headquarters in Zape yesterday. – Photo: Tony Wong
