THE city’s traffic police are investigating a man surnamed Zhao who is suspected of using duplicate license plates and a falsified certificate and car license for a smuggled Maserati car.

    A woman named Tan who was the driver of the suspected smuggled car was caught by another Maserati car driver named Liu in a housing estate in Luohu District on Feb. 15. The two cars look identical, and the certificates that were provided by the two drivers, including the license plates and the serial numbers, were the same.

    However, a police investigation revealed that the serial number on Tan’s car had been modified and the documents were forged. Tan claimed that she wasn’t the owner of the car, which police suspected had been smuggled from overseas. The car is owned by Zhao.

    The owner of the legal Maserati, Liu, bought the car in Shenzhen in 2012 for 2.6 million yuan (US$378,787). However, she suspected that her car plates had been duplicated when some of her friends said that they had seen her car in the street while she was keeping the car at home.

    Liu made a report to Nanshan police and found that three traffic violations, which she hadn’t been involved in, had been handled by others. On Feb. 15, Liu’s friend found the car in a parking lot on Nigang Road and confronted Tan when she appeared. Liu then called police.

    An investigation showed that Tan was working at a car dealing shop and was taking care of the car for her friend Zhao, who was overseas, and yet, the car owner blacklisted Liu after receiving her calls.

    The case is still under investigation. (Han Ximin)