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Guangdong

Traffic accident scam pair jailed

Two fraudsters have been jailed in Dongguan for staging fake traffic accidents in order to claim large amounts of compensation from the driver, an act known as pengci. The men, surnamed Liu and Tan, made around 20,000 yuan ($2,870) from their scams, according to Dongguan No 1 Intermediate People's Court. In one incident, the pair were bought a gold necklace by a driver after Liu pretended to have been hit by her car, while Tan passed himself off as a police officer. For the crime of extortion, Liu and Tan were jailed for 18 and 14 months, respectively, and fined 3,000 yuan.