The Judiciary Police (PJ), in conjunction with the Chinese mainland’s Public Security Bureau (PSB), have busted an illegal currency exchange case, PJ spokesman Chao Teng Hin and Organised Crime Division Section Chief Ho Wai Lok said during a special press conference on Friday.
Chao identified the four illegal currency exchange dealers as aged between 29 and 55, surnamed Wong, Sou, Chan and Lam. Three of them worked for Wong.
According to Ho, on July 8, through a notification and liaison mechanism with the mainland’s PSB and intelligence sharing, the Judiciary Police identified two pawnshops owned by Wong, in Zape and Nam Van respectively. Both shops are suspected of long-term illegal currency exchange services specifically catering to gambling activities, with financial ties to an underground banking operation in Zhuhai. The case involves at least 80 clients and a cumulative transaction volume of HK$ 253,000 (totalling 260,650 patacas). The Judiciary Police have verified the identities of multiple gamblers who engaged in illegal currency exchange at the two implicated shops.
In a synchronised operation with mainland police on Thursday, Ho said, the Judiciary Police deployed over 20 investigators to raid the two pawnshops. During the operation, they seized HK$516,000 in cash, 216,000 patacas in cash, two POS terminals, two ledgers used to record illegal currency exchanges, and multiple mobile phones used for transfers. Subsequently, at Wong’s home in Patane district, an additional HK$280,000 in suspected backup cash for illicit exchanges was confiscated.
During the investigation, according to Ho, Wong refused to cooperate. However, Sou, Chan and Lam confessed that Wong provided the capital, while they were tasked with conducting currency exchanges with clients and required to record the daily exchange amounts to report to Wong. Through the illegal exchange services related to gambling offered by his shops, Wong was involved in a total amount of at least HK$7.26 million, with an estimated illegal profit of no less than HK$363,000, according to Ho.
The quartet were transferred to the Public Prosecutions Office (MP) on Friday facing illegal currency exchange charges.
Evidence seized from Wong’s two pawnshops is displayed during Friday’s special press conference at the Judiciary Police (PJ) headquarters in Zape. – Photos: Armindo Neves
