Former Prosecutor-general Ho Chio Meng’s defence lawyers protested against testimony given by the main Commission Against Corruption (CCAC) investigator responsible for the case, as the corruption trial against the former top official continued on Friday.
The Court of Final Appeal heard the testimony of Ao Pan San, CCAC’s top investigator, who presented the investigation procedures and facts using a PowerPoint presentation, leading the defence to object to the presiding Judge Sam Hou Fai.
The PowerPoint presentation presented all the nearly 1,500 crimes allegedly committed by the former Prosecutor-general’s criminal association – supposedly carried out by Mr. Ho and his business partners and relatives.
“The witness is making a speech and presenting the accusations like they’re confirmed facts, while some details of the PowerPoint were not provided to the defence,” stated Ho’s lawyer, Leong Weng Pun.
Despite the protest, the judge allowed the witness to continue her testimony, stating that all the facts in the presentation had been provided to the defence and that the presentation method was made in accordance with the law.
Assumption alley
Although plenty of evidence was presented to demonstrate links between a defendant in a related case regarding the front companies managed from the Public Prosecution’s Office on the 16th floor of the Hotline building, the CCAC investigator – in charge of finding connections between the former Prosecutor-general and the other defendants – admitted that evidence for certain accusations hadn’t been found, with some conclusions being based on “assumptions”.
One of the pieces of evidence presented by the CCAC investigator included records of exits and entries through the Gongbei Border that showed defendants Mak Im Tai and Wong Kuok Wai having passed through multiple times together, with other records of Mr. Ho and his brother and brother-in-law also passing through the border at the same times.
However the investigation only found one occasion where Mr. Ho and all the defendants had passed through the border together in 2014, allegedly to attend to the funeral of the father of the former top official in Mainland China.
Ms. Ao argued that this was one of the facts that proved that the relationship between Mr. Ho and the other businessmen was closer than that of simply contractor and supplier.
“How does going together to a funeral prove criminal association?” defence lawyer Leong demanded.
Mr. Ho also responded in court that the trip was carried out to collect his father’s ashes, and that businessman Mak Im Tai wasn’t going along on the trip to organise the funeral, as was presented in the accusations.
Other findings presented were in regards to records of eight phone calls to Mr. Ho, made between 2010 and 2014 from numbers belonging to some of the 10 front companies based on the 16th floor of the Hotline building.
According to Ms. Ao, CCAC considered that the calls were “probably” made by Wong Kuok Wai and Mr. Ho’s brother, who were described by previous witnesses in court as both being involved in the running of the front companies said to have used illicit means to obtain almost MOP50 million (US$6.2 million) from the Office’s funds.
Night school
Other evidence presented included CCTV footage and wire tap records showing that Mr. Ho and businessman Mak Im Tai had met late at night in a spa in 2015, described on the phone as a ‘night school’.
According to the CCAC investigator, the former top official used these meetings to discreetly coordinate activities to grant almost 1,300 service contracts from the Public Prosecution’s Office to the front companies run by the other defendants.
Certain facts presented angered the Prosecutor, such as statements made by Ms. Ao that CCTV footage of a car belonging to Mr. Ho’s brother – entering the car park of an apartment that the Prosecution stated Ho had purchased for the use of one of the defendants, Wang Xiandi – proved that Ho was behind the wheel of the car.
According to Ms. Ao, CCAC believed Mr. Ho was driving the car because his brother wasn’t in Macau at that time. The former Prosecutor responded that the apartment was bought for the use of his father, and that he hadn’t been driving the car, and even if he had been, it would only have been to visit his father.
The court also dismissed evidence presented by Ms. Ao that a certain signature was made by Mr. Ho to approve several service contracts to be changed before presenting them to the Office.
The evidence was dismissed because accusations were based only on what the CCAC investigator had heard directly from the former chief of the Group of General Administration of the MP, in his initial statements that were not registered in writing.
