HONG KONG Law and Practice Contributed by: Gareth Hughes, Emily Lam, Philip Rohlik and Tiffany Wu, Debevoise & Plimpton LLP
sentence. On the other hand, aggravating fac - tors such as repeated misconduct could lead to more severe penalties upon conviction. See also 5.2 Guidelines Applicable to the Assessment of Penalties . Further, as stated in 4.5 Safe Harbour or Amnes- ty Programme , a witness or informer may under certain circumstances be granted immunity from prosecution. 7.5 Recent Landmark Investigations or Decisions Malpractice in football match-fixing and illegal gambling has been an area of focus of corruption investigations in recent years. Following opera - tion “Green Grass”, which the ICAC commenced in May 2023 to neutralise a corruption syndicate that participated in football match-fixing and ille - gal gambling, the ICAC began another campaign (known as operation “Tenacity”) in May 2024, which involved the bribing of members of foot - ball clubs for match-fixing to facilitate syndicate members in profiting from illegal gambling on football games over the course of three seasons. In this operation, 12 individuals, including foot - ball players, coaches and betting agents, were arrested for allegedly having offered and accept - ed bribes for manipulating football players’ per - formances and match results, in violation of Section 9 of POBO. Investigations revealed that the players involved would receive a bribe that ranged from several thousand dollars to tens of thousands of dollars per match. The ICAC has laid charges against three of the arrestees, and the corruption investigation is ongoing. Another major investigation concerned a bribery scam related to annual vehicle examinations. In Hong Kong, it is mandatory for private cars of six years or above to undergo an annual examina - tion at a designated car testing centre appoint -
ed by the Transport Department. In June 2024, in an operation code-named “Gale”, the ICAC arrested a total of 20 people for, among other things, allegedly accepting bribes from owners of garages for falsifying annual vehicle examina - tion results, thereby circumventing the examina - tion procedures of the Transport Department. In the same operation, the ICAC executed search warrants at various premises and seized ten cars, which were subsequently re-examined by the Transport Department and found to have failed the annual vehicle examination. Among the persons arrested, three have been charged for conspiracy to forge certificates of roadwor - thiness for private cars and light goods vehicles. In October 2024, the ICAC mounted further sig - nificant operations and arrested 148 individuals for alleged bribery and forgery over profession - al qualifications for construction and electrical works. The scam involved rendering assistance by corrupt means to those unqualified in obtain - ing professional certificates for operating exca - vators, or applying for electrical work certificates by corrupt means. See the Hong Kong Trends and Developments chapter in this guide for details. Following an investigation jointly conducted by the ICAC and the SFC, the ICAC recently laid charges against three individuals, including a former manager of the Investment Products Department of the Securities and Futures Com - mission, and a senior government counsel of the Department of Justice, for conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office. The former manager of the SFC was alleged to have divulged confi - dential information concerning a rights issue of a real estate investment trust fund from January to February 2023 to two other individuals, who then made use of such information to conduct multiple derivatives transactions and obtained
200 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook