The trap I fell into

It all started when I met a man at Taboo – a bar located in Wanchai. The man has dark skin and calls himself Mapan, from America. I had known him for one month only. 

On one Sunday night, which was my last encounter with him, he offered to pay for my drink and gave me HKD1000 to pay for food and a taxi to get home since it was already late at night and the MTR had closed. I originally wanted to go home earlier but he told me to stay, that’s why he gave me money to go home. I arrived home around 3 am that night.

The following Monday, 13th September, he called me. He sent me three documents via Whatsapp, and asked me to help pick up something for him. I rejected his request because I did not have time given that on that day I had to get my Covid vaccine. I had no idea what the documents were about, and I deleted them after he called me and told me to delete all my chat history with him. He was pretty angry with me on that day since I rejected his request.

On Tuesday afternoon (14th September), he suddenly called me again. I was not feeling well because of the vaccine I took the previous day. I rejected his request again because I felt dizzy but then he got very angry at me for trying to reject him again. He called me again and begged me to help him for just that one time. He claimed he was really busy with work and did not have time to pick it up himself. I felt really bad because he repeatedly begged me with the hope that I could help him that day. And then, he started blaming me that I wasn’t having a serious relationship with him. We had only known each other for one month and I always rejected him whenever he asked to have sex with me. I told him I couldn’t just sleep with a man that I only knew for a brief time.

From that point on, he got really angry and he called me telling me that I only used him for the money and I wasn’t serious at all with him, even though the only time he gave me money was the HKD1000 that was used to pay for my food, drink, and taxi two days before. He further said that he wanted to have a serious relationship with me and to cover my and my family’s daily needs, and even promised to marry me! At that time my heart was moved and I believed all his lies. I pitied and had compassion for him because I thought that he was a good guy.

Even though I was unwell I pushed myself to go to pick up his package. When I asked him what was inside the package, he told me it had clothes and shoes inside. The address he gave me was No. 3 King Shing Street, Causeway Bay. He told me to wait around that area and not long after, he called me and asked whether I saw a white-colored car. He told me to send him the photo of the car and I did as directed.

Not too long after that, he called me again and told me to walk toward the car and take the package. Mapan also sent me an image of a receipt to my Whatsapp. I was pretty much on the phone with him as I retrieved the package. The man inside the car asked me to show the receipt on my Whatsapp to match the address and telephone number written on the package. The delivery man also asked me to sign a form after he gave me the package.

I got the package and casually took the bus to Central. After arriving at Central, I exchanged buses to Yuen Long to drop the package off. From there I took a taxi to go to an address in Kam Tin that Mapan gave me. Mapan was really angry with me after finding out that I did not follow his instruction to take a taxi all the way from Causeway Bay to Kam Tin. My thought was that it would be very expensive to take a taxi and even if he gave me money to cover the travel cost I could have saved up a little bit from there. He did not stop calling me and asking me where I was. I just told him I was in a taxi even though I was actually taking the bus. He ended up video calling me and he was furious upon finding out that I had lied to him. He questioned my decision to take the bus rather than a taxi and then told me to rush because his friend was waiting for me at the Kam Tin bus stop. I called him to clarify to whom I should give the package. He told me to just give it to his friend.

Upon arriving at Kam Tin, and as I was about to open the taxi door, a plain-clothes officer intercepted me and showed me his ID card. I was pretty shocked. He took me to his car and asked me what’s inside the package. I innocently and honestly told him it had shoes inside. The officer asked me to work together with him to drop the package at the target address (the bus stop) and I gave my consent to collaborate. I gave the officer my phone password as part of the operation and not too long after, Mapan called me. The officer picked up his call and recorded his voice. Mapan told me to go quickly as his friend had been waiting for a long time. I just said yes. After arriving at the meeting point, I waited for quite a while together with the officer. Mapan’s friend never showed up.

The officer brought me to the customs office at North Point to be further interrogated. I told the officers honestly what happened and the officer found out that the package contained narcotics rather than shoes. The weight was around 2,063 grams. The officer also found the three document files that I’d previously erased in the ‘Deleted’ folder on my phone. Apparently, those documents were also for drugs (839, 1500, and 837 grams dated 12th and 13th September) which I did not pick up. The police combined all these papers into one case for a total of 5,239 grams of narcotics.

I knew nothing about these narcotics and I did not even receive any penny for this. I was just honestly helping him because he treated me as his girlfriend and so I treated him as my boyfriend. I thought he was serious when he was just using me. The officer also wrote that I trafficked a total of 5,239 grams even though I did not pick up the first three packages and only took the 2,063 grams one at Causeway Bay. 

I want to find that guy and put him in prison. I don’t know what to do, I have no one here to help me, and I also don’t speak the language.   

Note: This letter has been edited to facilitate reading and to correct errors (the original letter mistakenly mentions that the package was in kilograms)