A 48-year-old housewife met a scammer on a social platform and quickly developed a relationship, but she fell into the "killing pig" scam. She sent money to the scammer's designated investment account many times, and was defrauded of 2.8 million yuan.
After investigation, the police arrested five men and two women on suspicion of "conspiracy to defraud".
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Inspector Chen Kai of the New Territories South Regional Public Activities Investigation Team explained the case that a 48-year-old housewife met a liar on a social platform in April 2022, and it quickly developed into an online dating relationship.
The scammer then tricked the victim into opening an investment account on a fake investment website, saying that the investment would have extremely high returns.
The victim was not afraid of fraud, and then remitted a number of huge sums of money to the account designated by the fraudster.
Afterwards, the victim saw that there was a lot of profit in the investment account and wanted to withdraw money.
However, the scammer claimed that the victim's investment amount was not up to the standard and needed to provide more investment amount.
The fraudsters also learned that the victim and his family held a joint account in the Mainland with considerable funds that could be misappropriated.
The scammers then took the victim to three shops in Tsuen Wan and Yuen Long for cash out activities.
During the process, the victim used a mainland UnionPay card to pay the bill, but the victim did not get the goods, but instead got some funds converted from the spending amount, and the three stores received service fees from it.
The victim then added the funds to the investment account until the victim wanted to withdraw money again on May 28, and the scammer was nowhere to be seen.
The victim knew he had been deceived and called the police for help.
The New Territories South Crime Department and Lantau Police District detectives conducted in-depth investigation and analysis, and quickly identified 7 suspects. From June 8 to 10, 5 men and 2 women, aged between 26 and 53, were arrested on suspicion of "conspiracy to defraud" .
During the operation, the police seized 14 mobile phones, 2 computers, 2 credit card swiping machines, 8 bank cards and 6 credit cards.
Police have charged two of them with "conspiracy to defraud".
The police are now investigating other persons involved and the flow of funds. It cannot be ruled out that money laundering activities and more arrests will be made.
The police appeal to the public to be more vigilant of investment plans with unrealistically high returns, to avoid downloading apps from unknown sources, and to fully understand the features and information of relevant investment products before investing.
