Pay up or we flood your flat – Hong Kong crime gangs use new tactic to collect debts
Police reveal ‘zero cost’ method after arresting two suspected triad members
Illegal debt collectors are using fire hoses to make people pay up – threatening to spoil their homes and belongings unless they hand over cash.
Police revealed the new tactic on Thursday after arresting two suspected triad members in connection with three reports of illegal debt collection in which one victim had his home flooded.
The man, a decorator who lives in a public housing flat in Tin Shui Wai, borrowed HK$8,000 from an unlicensed moneylender in Mong Kok in November but failed to pay it back.
When he returned home on February 19 after a three-day trip to the mainland, he found his flat flooded with water. Police are treating the case as criminal damage.
Senior Inspector Cheung Po-yuet of the New Territories North regional crime unit said illegal debt collectors used the fire hose in the corridor of the building.
