Judiciary Police (PJ) spokeswoman Lei Hon Nei said during a regular press conference yesterday that five victims had separately fallen for fake police scams, and four of them were cheated out of a total of around 3 million patacas.
The victims comprise three females and two males. One of the victims, a university student from the mainland studying in Macau, was scammed out of 2.3 million yuan.
According to Lei, in that case, the victim received phone calls from individuals claiming to be staff members of a specific mainland bureau in early March. The callers made preposterous accusations, alleging that the victim’s parcels contained illegal items and that her identity had been used for illegal activities in the mainland.
Believing the claims to be true, the victim transferred on various occasions different amounts of cash as a “security deposit” to the designated bank accounts provided by the fraudsters. Subsequently, she received a call from a genuine anti-fraud centre, which alerted her to the scam and prompted her to report the incident to the police.
The remaining three victims suffered losses of HK$95,000, HK$366,000, and 120,000 patacas, respectively. The fourth victim did not transfer any money to the scammers.
Judiciary Police (PJ) spokeswoman Lei Hon Nei looks on during yesterday’s regular press conference.
– Photo: William Chan
