Cops: Hotel Guest Skips Out on Bill After 603 Nights

A man checked into a ritzy hotel in India on May 30, 2019, and booked his room for one night. More than 600 nights later—on Jan. 22, 2021—the guest identified as Ankush Dutta checked out from the five-star Roseate House in Delhi without paying a cent, reports the Guardian. How he managed to avoid a bill of about $70,000 is now the subject of a police investigation, reports Indian Express.

A front-office manager at the hotel and other staffers also are in hot water, with police alleging that they hacked into the computer system and fudged Dutta's records again and again over the course of his stay in exchange for cash bribes. "Accounts were falsified to conceal the actual outstanding dues," reads the police complaint. The shaky bookkeeping came to light in a recent review of the hotel books, say police. (More weird crimes stories.)