SIBU: A single mother with a 10-year-old daughter was cheated after falling for a romantic foreign man ‘travelling around the world from Paris to New York and Kuala Lumpur’.
How their love flourished proved to be an incredible romantic tale of modern times – the two held candied talk through Google Translation and their romance flourished to such an extent that the man called the single mother ‘Honey’ and the 43-year-old called him ‘Hubby’ or, in Mandarin, ‘Lao Gong’.
Their relationship developed in just a month with the man capturing her heart.
Then came the cheating.
The man told the woman on Monday he had arrived in Kuala Lumpur to meet her, but was detained by immigration officers because he brought in too much cash.
He asked the woman to bank in RM2,500 so he could bribe the officers for his release.
The single mother was so caught up in the romance that she believed him.
She borrowed the sum from a friend and banked it to him through a bank account of a local woman, whom the man said would help him with the bribe.
The con case was exposed when the woman came crying to Lanang MP Alice Lau on Tuesday. The woman related their romance to Lau.
On analysing the facts of the case, Lau felt suspicious and asked the woman to seek police help. Lau said there was possibility of cheating but the woman refused to believe her, insisting they were in love and the man had come to see her.
The woman was emotional and crying, fearing for the man’s safety.
She pleaded with Lau to call her ‘hubby’ to ensure he was safe, as she herself could not communicate with him.
Lau tried to wake her up, saying if the man was detained, how could he talk to her. After much coaxing, the woman went to the police station with Lau.
When the single mother related her story to the cops, they advised her to lodge a report to probe the likely con case.
But she pleaded for Lau and the police to call the Immigration Department in Kuala Lumpur to ensure her hubby was safe.
When a policeman used a different phone to call the number the woman gave, the call was not answered.
Lau then used the phone of the single mother and, this time, the man picked up the phone but refused to talk to Lau, insisting he would talk to his ‘honey’ only. He then asked the single mother not to call him again – just bank in the money for his release.
The cops then asked the woman to communicate with him through Google Translation to ask for his passport number so police in Sibu could follow up the case.
The man replied there was no need, and that she just needed to send the money.
Later the woman found the Facebook account of her paramour closed. Police believe the man had sensed trouble and closed his Facebook account.
Shortly after, the man created another Facebook account with a different name but with the same photograph to communicate with the single mother, saying he had been released.
The woman had by now come to her senses and lodged a police report. She pleaded with police to investigate the con case.
The romance ended with a RM2,500 debt for the single mother.