A mainland man was arrested for assisting a gang in collecting fraudulently obtained money through “guess who I am” phone scams in Macau, in which the 37-year-old man pretending to be a “lawyer” received a total of 186,000 patacas from two local senior citizens on Wednesday in the northern district, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Lei Chi Hou said during a special press conference yesterday.
According to yesterday’s special press conference about the case, two local residents, a female and male senior citizens, received calls on their landlines from a purported “son-in-law” and “grandson”, claiming that they had injured someone and had to handed over 120,000 patacas and 66,000 patacas in cash to a “lawyer” as “compensation” respectively.
A PJ investigation, according to Lei, identified the “lawyer” as a man surnamed Qiu, and he told the police he is jobless.
After the female victim handed over the money to the “lawyer”, she again received another phone call claiming that the person her “son-in-law” had injured was in critical condition, and needed an additional 300,000 patacas as “compensation”, Lei said.
However, the female victim did not have enough money, so she phoned her daughter only to find out that she had been scammed. They reported the case to the police.
According to Lei, the female victim then pretended to agree to hand over the money to the “lawyer” again, and when Qiu showed up to collect the money, PJ officers arrested him.
In the operation, PJ officers recovered the 56,000 patacas in cash from the suspect and seized two mobile phones that are suspected of being related to the case, Lei said.
Qiu told the police that he had handed 130,000 patacas he obtained from the victims to his partners in crime near a hotel in Cotai, and he received a payment of 16,000 patacas, Lei said, adding that PJ officer discovered that Qiu also receive 66,000 patacas from a male senior citizen in the same way
The police are still tracing the whereabouts of the money and the rest of the people involved in the case. Qiu was referred to the Public Prosecutions Office (MP) for investigation, facing a charge of fraud involving a considerably large sum of money.
Lei reminded members of the public to beware of “guess who I am” scams, especially the elderly, if they receive suspected fraudulent calls, they should immediately contact the person concerned or other relatives and friends for confirmation, and those suspecting that they have fallen victim to a scam should call the Judiciary Police’s anti-fraud hotline 8800 7777 or crime report hotline 993 for assistance.
Judiciary Police (PJ) officers escort the hooded fraud suspect from the mainland involved in a “guess who I am” phone scam from the PJ headquarters in Zape to a PJ vehicle yesterday. – Photo: Ginnie Liang
