LUOHU police recently busted a ring suspected of perpetrating loan scams and six suspects have been arrested.

A woman surnamed Long was one of the victims of the loan scams. Long, who needed cash for her business, got to know a man surnamed Tang, who claimed to work for a small loan company, last September.

Long wanted to borrow 500,000 yuan (US$79,491) from the company. Tang produced blank contracts and a mortgage contract for Long to sign, saying that the contracts would help conceal her other debt liabilities and hence help her get the loans more quickly and easily. Long signed them.

After Long’s application was approved, Tang withheld 300,000 yuan on the excuse of needing to pass bank cash-flow checks and demanded another 190,000 yuan from Long to pay for deposits and service fees. Long ended up getting only 7,500 yuan in hand.

When Long went to the loan company to inquire, the company made a counter-charge, demanding that Long pay back the 500,000-yuan loan as she had violated the contract by hiding her debt liabilities. The company asked the court to confiscate Long’s property in a few days.

Long reported the case to Guiyuan Police Station, which had received similar reports.

In another case, a man surnamed Zheng in Luohu District borrowed 50,000 yuan in November 2016 from a man surnamed Ou, who claimed to be an employee of a small loan company. Ou promised Zheng the loan after Zheng signed a mortgage contract for his 9-million-yuan apartment. Zheng got 20,000 yuan after Ou deducted the deposit, interest and service fees based on different excuses.

Two months later, Ou contacted Zheng to help him secure more loans to pay back the previous loan, and Zheng borrowed another 140,000 yuan. Between November 2016 and July 2017, Zheng got seven loans through Ou. Zheng called the police after the suspects threatened to repossess his apartment in court.

“Zheng was 2.2 million yuan in debt to the suspects over eight months, although he actually received only 179,000 yuan,” said Tang Cheng, a detective with Huangbeiling Police Station.

“This type of scam is very deceptive by using the disguise of private lending. The suspects target people who have apartments and are in need of cash, and create evidence in their favor,” said Song Zaicheng, unit chief of the Criminal Investigation Department of Luohu Public Security Bureau.

The apartments were unlocked by the court after the police closed the cases. (Han Ximin)