Suburban Shanghai park ticket collectors nabbed as scalpers
Yuehu Sculpture Park in Shanghai's suburban Songjiang District.
Four ticket collectors at Yuehu Sculpture Park in suburban Songjiang District have been taken into custody for alleged ticket scalping activities, Shanghai police said on Thursday.
They began their illegal activities in 2019, having sold thousands of park tickets at discounts to visitors so far, police revealed.
Police in Songjiang launched their investigation recently after a resident reported that he was offered a discounted ticket by one of the park's ticket collectors.
The ticket in question was stipulated as a gift ticket given by a nearby hotel, police said.
The investigation showed that sometimes when visitors handed over their entry tickets at the gate, the four suspects kept the full intact tickets with them instead of voiding them right away by tearing off a part of the paper.
While a regular ticket for adults at the park costs 100 yuan (US$15), the suspects sold the recycled tickets to visitors who didn't have the tickets for 50 yuan to 70 yuan, police said.
The suspects even allegedly talked some visitors into getting a refund for their originally purchased tickets and then buy discounted ones from them.
The suspects have so far sold recycled tickets worth more than 400,000 yuan, police revealed.
A fifth suspect, a man surnamed Jia, allegedly purchased a part of the recycled tickets for 40 yuan each from the four and sold them at 60 yuan to 70 yuan to people who wanted to visit the park.
Jia made a profit of about 40,000 yuan in this way, according to police, who added that the five suspects could face the criminal charge of embezzlement.
Some of the seized park tickets in the case.
