Four arrested in Hong Kong over HK$70m mortgage fraud using fake payroll records
Hong Kong police arrested three men and one woman for allegedly defrauding three financial institutions of over HK$70 million in mortgage loans using fake payroll records and forged documents between 2021 and 2023.
Hong Kong police’s Commercial Crime Bureau arrested three men and one woman on Tuesday on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud, alleging they used forged payroll records and fake documents to obtain more than HK$70 million in mortgage loans from three financial institutions for a residential property.
Senior Inspector Wong Kam-wing of the Commercial Crime Bureau said the suspects, aged between 30 and 42, claimed to be a property agent, a company director and a nurse. Police investigations revealed that between 2021 and 2023, the applicants created shell companies with accomplices to fabricate payroll records and employment certificates, inflating their incomes to meet lenders’ mortgage requirements and tricking the financial institutions into approving the loans.
During the operation, police searched multiple premises including the companies’ offices and the suspects’ homes, seizing mobile phones, computers, company documents and stamps used to produce the forged documents.
The four suspects are being held for questioning, and police did not rule out further arrests.