TAIYUAN - Police in North China's Shanxi province have seized three people who swindled a man out of over 220,000 yuan and tricked him into buying "illicit cash" which turns out to be ghost money.

Police in the city of Jinzhong said Saturday they also seized 16 phones and around 1 million yuan ($151,000) of fake notes.

The suspects, all from Anhui Province, confessed they have lured targets and sold fake notes or ghost money to them, fabricating the fake money to be cash involved in corruption cases, since the beginning of this year.

Police started investigating the case in late November when a man surnamed Zhang said he paid more than 220,000 yuan for "1-million-yuan illicit cash," which later he found to be ghost money, or joss paper which is burned as an offering to help the dead in their afterlife.

Further investigation into the case is under way.