Hong Kong police have arrested 25 people – from teens to old-age pensioners – in a crackdown on a syndicate-linked loan-sharking ring that had lent over HK$200 million ($25 million) to about 2,000 people in a year, the force said on Thursday.

Of the 25 arrested – 20 men and five women, aged 13 to 69 – four claimed to be students, officers said.

Police said several of the detainees were suspected of being syndicate leaders and core members. The accused face charges of lending at extortionate interest rates, criminal damage, criminal intimidation, and money laundering.

The teenage suspects had been recruited via social media messages offering a fast buck, Superintendent Lo Ka-chun of the Police’s Organized Crime and Triad Bureau (OCTB) told a press briefing. He cautioned young people against “easy money” pitches, saying they often serve as a cloak for recruitment into criminal networks.

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According to Lo, the gang had lent more than HK$200 million to about 2,000 people over the past year, with some at an annual interest rate of 282 percent – almost six times the 48 percent allowed by law. Individual loans ranged from tens of thousands of Hong Kong dollars to more than HK$100,000.

Police launched the raids on August 4 and 5 at three centers run by the loan-shark ring in Mong Kok and Fo Tan, along with several residential addresses. The operation followed an OCTB investigation that had been in progress since April into triad-related usury networks, Lo said.

Senior Inspector Fung Yun-wo of the OCTB revealed that HK$1.94 million in cash was seized from the Mong Kok center, and an additional HK$8.4 million in criminal proceeds held in bank accounts belonging to the group and its core members was frozen.

Fung said the operation has so far restrained more than HK$10.34 million in seized cash and frozen assets, and that officers continue to track down the rest of the group’s funds.

He added that initial estimates show no less than HK$8 million in illicit gains had been funneled into private bank accounts belonging to the lending ring’s bosses over the past year.

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Police investigations revealed that the group had been operating under the cover of licensed credit firms, luring borrowers with loans without income verification, but then imposing exorbitant interest and administrative costs, while using various pretexts to extract even more payments from victims.

When borrowers failed to repay on time, the group added extra interest and fines on top of existing debts and resorted to unlawful means to recover debts, including criminal intimidation and criminal damage, OCTB’s Acting Chief Inspector Yeung Kwan-ho explained. “Many of those sent to collect debts at borrowers’ homes are only 13 or 14 years old,” he said, “making such crimes utterly reprehensible.”

All of the arrested were released on bail and will have to report to the police in mid-September.

Police reaffirmed their zero-tolerance stance towards loan-sharking, especially those linked to triads, and pledged to continue taking robust action against such crimes.

They further urged the public to only seek loans from licensed and trustworthy lenders, and to steer clear of fraudulent advertisements offering “low interest”, “no income checks”, or “express approval”.

Falling for such gimmicks, police cautioned, “would turn borrowers into cash machines for criminal groups, bankrolling gangsters’ extravagance while dragging victims into an inescapable abyss of debt”.

Contact the writer at wanqing@chinadailyhk.com