A mainland Chinese man has admitted in court that he tried to rob a bank of HKD2 million, about US$256,000, armed with only a pair of 10-centimeter-long scissors.
The 49-year-old man, surnamed Sun, pleaded guilty to one count of extortion and one count of possession of an offensive weapon in public at the District Court today.
The incident took place on December 6, 2016, when Sun went to a Fubon Bank branch in Tsim Sha Tsui, walked up to bank teller, and slipped her a piece of paper. According to Ming Pao, the note demanded that Sun be given HKD2 million within two minutes, and said he was holding the teller’s family hostage.
The teller secretly notified her supervisor of the situation and stalled Sun by repeatedly asking him for valid identification until the police were notified and other customers were safely evacuated. The quick-thinking employee, who was not identified in court, reportedly kept Sun waiting for 20 minutes until the police arrived and arrested him.
We don’t personally have footage of the event, but we imagine it went something like this:
Upon searching the 49-year-old, police found another piece of paper and a pair of scissors. Why he didn’t go three for three and bring a rock too (you know, for that pesky glass divider) is beyond us.
During mitigation, Sun’s defense counsel argued that he had not been threatening, as he concealed the blade of his scissors by keeping them folded, and could not have possibly harmed the bank teller’s family as he had been working alone.
The court heard that Sun lost his job as a chef in mainland China and stayed unemployed for 10 months before coming to Hong Kong for “easy money”. He will be remanded in police custody until sentencing on Monday.
