Police catch female Chinese fugitive despite her having plastic surgery to 'evade capture'

An alleged Chinese scammer who underwent plastic surgery to change her appearance was arrested in Thailand.

Jing Qu, 30, reportedly duped her victims out of 1.52 million CNY (162,385 GBP) by offering them sought after flight attendant jobs at several famous airlines.

She was said to have used part of the money for cosmetic surgeries to avoid recognition as she fled to Thailand.

Police arrested the suspected fugitive on October 7, following a tip-off about a 'suspicious' Chinese guest staying at a luxury condominium in the Phra Ram 4 area of Bangkok.

Police Major General Prasart Khemaprasit, Commander of Immigration Bureau 1, said: 'There was a Chinese individual who was believed to be in the Kingdom in violation of the law.

'She exhibited suspicious behavior, often hiding her face with a hat and a mask when leaving the building. Therefore, I ordered a task force to observe the area and set up a team to monitor the vicinity.'

Officers arrested Jing Qu while she was ordering food at a restaurant in the first floor of the condo. They checked her passport and found that she had been overstaying in Thailand for more than 650 days on a TR-15 tourist visa issued in 2022.

When grilled about her expired travel documents, Jing Qu was reportedly evasive and claimed she was a flight attendant stuck in Thailand after being laid off.

Police said they do not believe her claims as she had a tourist on arrival visa, and not a special visa issued to foreign nationals working as airline staff.

They also found that Jing Qu was the subject of an Interpol Blue Notice. Her previous photo showed her with a rounder face and wider nose - a stark contrast to her current appearance that featured a slimmer jawline and higher nose bridge.

She was allegedly wanted in China for a string of fraud cases from 2016 to 2019.

(1 GBP = 9.24 CNY)