LONGGANG police, in three teams, intercepted 1.8 million yuan (US$270,819) for a woman who was almost cheated by fraudsters.

Pinghu Police Station in Longgang District on Aug. 23 received a request for help from a man, surnamed Lian, who claimed that his wife might have been trapped in a phone scam.

Lian said, his wife, surnamed Liao, received a phone call at 8 a.m. that day, from a man who claimed to be a bank employee, before leaving home in a hurry.

Through the GPS system, Lian found that Liao had parked her car near a hotel in South China City, but he couldn’t reach her as she didn’t answer his calls.

At around 2 p.m., police aids found a woman who looked like Liao and was operating an ATM while talking on her phone. Police took her to the police station.

The woman was Liao and she said she received a phone call from a man who claimed he worked at the criminal investigation department and told her she had been involved in a money laundering case. The caller required her not to contact anyone and to transfer the 1.8 million yuan in her account to a safe account he would provide.

This is the largest amount that Longgang police have intercepted since the establishment of its anti-telecommunications fraud team. So far this year, the team has intercepted 200 phone scams and recovered 6 million yuan for victims. (Han Ximin)