Qingchen Jingjing’s mugshot went viral after a warrant was issued for her arrest. Photo: Weibo
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https://scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2175376/chinas-most-beautiful-criminal-turns-herself-police People & Culture
China’s ‘most beautiful criminal’ turns herself in, police say
- Suspect whose mugshot went viral on social media surrenders along with four other members of alleged gang
- Police investigating reports of money being scammed out of customers in bars and tea-houses
Qingchen Jingjing was wanted in connection with alleged bar scams. Photo: Weibo
A woman dubbed China’s most beautiful criminal has surrendered, police in the country’s southwest announced on their social media account on Wednesday.
Qingchen Jingjing, 19, and four alleged associates from a gang accused of scamming money out of customers in bars and tea-houses in the city of Mianyang, in Sichuan province, turned themselves in 12 days after arrest warrants were issued, the police said. Two other alleged gang members were still on the run.
Users of Weibo, China’s equivalent of Twitter, had suggested the wanted woman become a livestreamer after her mugshot went viral last week. “She must have seen the suggestions online, so she decided to spend a year in prison and become an influencer,” one person wrote after news of her surrender.
“Being beautiful is not your problem, but using your looks to commit illegal crimes is not right,” the local police’s Weibo account posted.
One person who claimed to be a former high school classmate of Qingchen told The Beijing News that other students called her the “classroom beauty” and she was popular with boys.
A previous report by Thecover.cn stated that Qingchen had become involved in the gang through a boyfriend. A former colleague told the online news portal that she had said she was going abroad with a boyfriend when she quit her old job.
Police investigated when a man reported being scammed out of thousands of yuan – hundreds of US dollars – at a bar in Mianyang’s science and technology district.
The police said the gang had been operating for at least half a year, targeting drunk people.
Qingchen’s possibly unwanted brush with fame mirrors that of Jeremy Meeks, arguably the world’s best-known “hot criminal”.
A former member of California’s notorious Crips gang, Meeks was arrested by California police in 2014 for gun possession and theft.
His mugshot went viral after it was posted online by police, and Meeks embarked on a lucrative modelling career after his release in 2016.