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Singaporean robbed in Dongguan
by Trixia Carungcong
05:55 AM Nov 03, 2010
SINGAPORE - A 53-year-old Singaporean man has filed a police report after being assaulted and robbed of $3,000 cash and two mobile phones in the Chinese city of Dongguan in Guangdong province during a trip there.
Mr Ho Kwok Hoong, a remisier and part-time martial arts instructor, told Today that the incident happened on Oct 12 at the tail end of his vacation in China. He said he arrived the day before for an overnight visit and last-minute shopping, before flying back to Singapore via Shenzhen.
While walking around a shopping area in Changping district, he said he was approached by an elderly woman who offered to show him more electronic products elsewhere. "She spoke Cantonese and I believe she was local," he said.
He was taken to the second floor of a building and "once I entered the house and the woman locked the door behind me, I sensed something was wrong", he said. Four men came out and started shouting at him, asking what he was doing there.
"I tried to run but they cornered me and we fought. I was no match for them, they were all big men," he said. The men spoke Mandarin and one of them later told him they were from Hubei.
The men tied his arms and legs with thick scotch tape and searched his pouch. They took his two mobile phones, $100 cash and 15,000 yuan ($2,900) but left some 300 yuan in his wallet.
The men also asked him for the PIN numbers for his credit card and ATM card. He initially refused, so "they tortured me for two hours by landing about 30 punches on my face and body". They also threatened to stab him if he made any noise and told him that they were holding a Malaysian man captive in the next room.
The men eventually succeeded in withdrawing $3,000 using his ATM card. He said they then took a photo of him naked - threatening to put it on the Internet if he reported the case to the police - before leaving.
Mr Ho said the Malaysian man untied him after the men left. He returned to Singapore that night and sought treatment in hospital. He said he was lucky that he only suffered swelling on the left side of his face and body and some scratches.
Mr Ho said the men told him that they usually targeted Malaysians, Singaporeans and Hong Kongers, whom they identified by the way the tourists wore their pouch over the front of their body. The men also told him that they "were not interested in violence, only money".
