A Chinese man defrauded several hotels by planting “dead cockroaches and used condoms” in the rooms and making complaints about hygiene problems. He then blackmailed them into offering him free stays and also demanded money from them. He was later arrested.

A South China Morning Post reports that a 21-year-old man identified as Jiang used props such as cicadas, dead cockroaches, used condoms and hair to stage hotel fraud. He would check in, allege unsanitary conditions and demand compensation or freebies.

Jiang came up with this plan after he ran out of funds that he was supposed to use to enroll in college

“Over a period of 10 months, Jiang frequently stayed in hotels, sometimes checking into three or four different ones in a single day. He would exploit minor deficiencies or plant insects, bugs and hair to threaten hotels with complaints or online coverage, demanding free stays or compensation,” a police officer from Linhai in Zhejiang told the outlet.

After Jiang successfully defrauded several hotels, the establishments began communicating with each other and identified Jiang as a customer who had made similar complaints, a hotel official told the newspaper. Then one of them reported him to the police when he tried to trick them.

“His complaints about alleged bugs and hair in the rooms were alarming. When we discussed these incidents with several other hotels, we noticed a recurring pattern with this guest,” the employee said.

An initial investigation after Jiang’s arrest at a local hotel discovered 23 packages containing items used in his fraud. Further investigation revealed that he had stayed in over 300 hotels since last year and had successfully deceived 63 of them. His scams have netted him a total of $5,200.