A 17-year-old girl who ran away from home wanted to elope with her 16-year-old boyfriend to China but needed money.

The duo then decided to "borrow" money from a sex worker — by pretending to be police officers.

Their plot failed when one perceptive sex worker didn't believe them as they were too young.

Both of them were arrested and charged in court.

Entrapped sex worker and posed as police officers

The girl pleaded guilty to one count of attempted extortion and one count of theft on Apr. 24.

The duo cannot be named as they were both minors when they committed the offences.

According to court documents, the girl ran away from home and hung out with her boyfriend.

While the pair was at Value Hotel along Balestier Road on Mar. 30, 2023, they discussed how to get money to buy flight tickets to China.

They then came up with the plan to "borrow" money from sex workers.

Their scheme involved contacting and engaging a sex worker via the Internet before entrapping her in the hotel room and extorting money from her.

The boy then called in a sex worker and requested her to provide him with a "massage service" in the hotel room.

She arrived around 9:25pm, and the boy had received her alone in the room.

He then let his girlfriend into the room while the victim was taking a shower.

The girl confronted the woman as soon as she got out of the bathroom and told her that the boy was her boyfriend and he was underage.

She then threatened to report the woman to the police if she did not transfer them S$1,500.

They also claimed to be police officers.

The victim eventually noticed that the pair looked young and realised that they were not police officers after all.

The pair begged her not to make a police report after realising that she caught on.

The victim went straight to the police station after she left the hotel room.

Stole S$24,900, scammed

The girl was also charged for stealing her mother's belongings in a separate incident on Mar. 25, 2023.

Her mother had made a police report on Mar. 26, 2023, at 11:17pm about the missing girl and the theft of her belongings.

The girl had reportedly stolen her mother's mobile phone and cash after the latter fell asleep after 8:45pm.

She could access her mother's phone as she knew her OCBC online banking details as she had previously helped her to pay bills.

According to investigations, the girl had been approached by an unknown man at Geylang on Mar. 26, 2023 and offered to help her withdraw money from her mother's bank account.

She accepted his offer and transferred a total of S$24,900 to four different accounts via PayNow.

She then claimed that he ran off without giving her the whole sum except for S$2,000.

The remaining amount has not been recovered.

She faces two other charges, including one for attempted theft of S$9,409 from an Alipay account.

These charges will be taken into consideration for sentencing, which was scheduled for a later date.

Top photo via Canva