Sixty-two Arrested Over Epidemic Fund Fraud

Police said on Friday they have arrested 62 people on suspicion of conspiring to cheat HK$2.8 million from a government scheme meant to help the travel industry during the pandemic.

The case involved seven small travel agencies.

The suspects include eight directors from the firms, as well as a student, housewives and unemployed people. They're aged between 19 and 62.

The directors were alleged to have asked their relatives and friends to give them their personal information to forge employment documents to boost the amount of subsidies they could get.

Police said they began the investigation after the Travel Agents Registry reported several suspicious applications in September.

Officers alleged that while the firms hired up to five people each, that number was inflated to between 11 to 20 in their application forms.

"It's really unusual for the travel firms to drastically increase their manpower in March when we were in a pandemic," said detective chief inspector Ho Siu-tung.

Ho added that most of the suspects, besides those directors, had never worked at the travel firms.

The suspects were released on bail.