Macau police have arrested two people, including a 48-year-old woman from Hong Kong, in connection with the murder of a man whose body was found in a hotel room.
The body of the 40-year-old victim, a Hong Kong national, was discovered in the bathroom of a luxury hotel in Cotai on Wednesday. There was a 20-centimeter-long knife wound on his neck, Macau Criminal Investigation Department said.
The victim also suffered a skull fracture and numerous injuries to his body, police spokesman Ho Chan-nam said on Thursday.
Bloodstained, six-centimeter-long fragments of a blade that had apparently been cleaned were found at the crime scene.
Media from Macau reported that the hotel was the Wynn Palace. Police assumed that the victim had been illegally exchanging money in casinos in Macau for over half a year.
They said the man won money at a casino on Wednesday morning and exchanged casino chips for cash worth about HK$2.5 million.
He returned to his hotel room around 10am. About five minutes later, a 40-year-old man from mainland China entered the room and stayed for 1.5 hours before taking a bag and meeting the woman from Hong Kong in the hotel lobby. He handed her the bag, which was believed to contain cash.
The suspect from the mainland returned to his room at noon and left the hotel by taxi with two bags at around 3 p.m., Ho said.
Officials said the suspect worked at the victim’s money exchange business for about three months.
The police received a report about the discovery of the victim’s body around 5 p.m. on Wednesday.
Both suspects were stopped later that day. Officers seized at least HK$1.3 million worth of cash from the male suspect and his apartment in Cotai.
Bloodstained clothing and two of the victim’s mobile phones were found outside a supermarket in Cotai. Officials said they believed the male suspect had changed clothes twice after the murder.
The woman from Hong Kong was suspected of laundering some of the stolen cash through casinos and transferring the money to mainland bank accounts via other money changers.
Both suspects, who are in custody for murder, robbery and money laundering, said they were unemployed.
