In the middle of this month, the Force will present Good Citizen Awards (GCA) to commend members of the public for assisting the Police in preventing and detecting crime. One of the GCA awardees is Mr Vincent Cheung, who is the Head of Trading for a bank. In his spare time, he orgainsed many seminars for officers of the Commercial Crime Bureau to explain the modus operandi of London Gold investment fraud and share his professional knowledge. In his interview with OffBeat, Mr Cheung said, “Although the Government and law enforcement agencies vigorously publicise anti-deception messages, many citizens still fall victim to fraud given the ever-changing modus operandi of fraudsters.”

Mr Cheung recalled, “In 2019, I had a chat with the head of Financial Crime Compliance Department of a bank about the prevalence of London Gold investment fraud in Hong Kong for decades, and we noted that the prosecution of such cases has remained difficult.” With a wealth of professional knowledge and rich experience in London Gold trading, Mr Cheung felt at the time that he should assist the Police in conducting fraud investigation and prosecution, and since then he has stepped on a very uncommon battlefield.

He explained that fraudsters very often use flattery and high returns as baits to lure victims into making investments, then they would request the victims to sign an authorisation to enable them to invest on the behalf of the victims. Fraudsters would then make frequent and unreasonable transactions to earn hefty commission and incur overnight interest, and eventually deplete the entire capital of the victims over a short period of time.

Mr Cheung understands that law enforcement agencies find it difficult to deal with this type of cases, because London Gold trading involves many financial knowledge and professional operating methods from the industry. To win this battle against deception, it is imperative to enhance law enforcement officers’ abilities to fight crime, and more knowledge sharing sessions and professional training should be provided to law enforcement agencies.

Mr Cheung and his professional team organised professional training courses on London Gold trading for police officers in 2019 and 2020, to dissect the modus operandi of London Gold fraudsters and methods to gather evidence to enhance investigators’ professional knowledge. Apart from providing training, he also entered the battlefield in person and volunteered as an expert witness for the Police and wrote reports. Mr Cheung pointed out that in order to win this battle against deception, the involvement from financial institutions is indispensable.

Mr Cheung is very pleased to receive the GCA award. He is glad that he could use his professional knowledge to assist the Police in fighting crime, and he hopes that he would inspire more people to use their expertise and professional knowledge to help those around them and contribute to society.