A casino dealer was arrested on Saturday for failing to pay a taxi fare of 349 patacas after a very long ride around the city, Public Security Police (PSP) spokeswoman Lai In Hong said in a regular press conference yesterday.
The local suspect surnamed Cheong is in his forties.
According to Lai, a cabbie reported to the police on January 13 that a drunken passenger had failed to pay his taxi fare of 349 patacas after a ride earlier that day. The victim told the police that he picked up a man reeking of alcohol in Rua da Luís Gonzaga Gomes in Zape at about 2 a.m. on January 13.
The man asked the cabbie to drive him to different places in the peninsula as well as Taipa before finally reaching the man’s home in Estrada Marginal da Ilha Verde.
The man then told him that he didn’t have enough cash for the taxi fare and needed to go up to his flat to get the money. The cabbie waited for about an hour outside the residential building but the man didn’t show up. The cabbie then reported the unpaid fare to the police.
Lai said the PSP officers identified the suspect through CCTV footage and told Cheong to report to a police station on Saturday. Cheong admitted that he hadn’t paid the taxi fare, saying that he had drunk a lot of alcohol earlier that night before taking the taxi. When he returned home, he was so drunk that he fell on the floor and went to sleep. He woke up at around noon on the next day and therefore, according to his statement to the police, had been unable to pay the fare.
Cheong has been transferred to the Public Prosecutions Office (MP), facing a charge of failing to pay a transport fare, according to Lai.
This undated handout photo provided by the Public Security Police (PSP) yesterday shows the suspect being escorted by a PSP officer to a police station in Nam Vam.
