Open Letter to Commissioner of Police Regarding to Police Abuse of Powers

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An Open letter to the Commissioner of Police regarding to the latest episode of Police Abuse of Powers

Mr. TANG King Shing

Commissioner of Police , Police Headquarters,

Sirs,

I write on behalf of Ms. Tracy Ho as well as the Alliance of Lehman Brothers Victims in Hong Kong to complain against your officers who authorise the ‘dawn raid’ against Ms. Ho for reason that she is suspected of having committed an act of common assault.
The alleged assault takes place at about 1625 hours on 21st May 2009 outside the Bank of China Building, which is situate at no. 1 Garden Road, Central. In addition to the gross disproportion between police action and the nature of the allegation, there are numerous dubious acts on the part of your officers during the process that could only be explained as intending to maximize the harassment and distress inflicted on Ms. Ho and her family.

The Dawn Raid

2. At about 07:30 hours on 19th August 2009 five detectives (three male and two female) in plain clothes claiming to be attached to the Central Police District or Division knocked on the door of Ms. Ho’s Residence in Choi Hung. The visit is a total surprise and when Ms. Ho answered the door your officers insisted that they wanted to enter the premises before they would reveal the purpose of their visit.

3. With utmost reluctance and distress of her family, Ms. allowed the officers into her home. One of the officers then produced a photograph to Ms. Ho and asked if she is the person in it. Although the photograph does not show her face, Ms. Ho recalled the scene which is the protest outside the Bank of China Building mentioned above.

4. When Ms. Ho was about to admit that she is the lady on the photograph, one of the officer threatened her to immediately produce the clothes and shoes she worn that day or else they would search for the items themselves. Perplexed by the sudden police interest in the event that happened months ago and pressured by the threatening language, Ms. Ho complied with the demand and produced the items accordingly. She was then asked to follow the officers to the police station for further enquiries but before leaving the premises she was asked to sign on the notebook of one of the officers that it was not an arrest and she was not therefore handcuffed.

A Trivial Offence

5. Ms. Ho arrived at the Central Police Station at Arsenal Street at about 0930 hours after having been taken to and asked to wait at the Ngau Tau Kok Police Station for some time during which your officers were presumably completing some formalities to record their action in another police area.

6. In the Central Police Station, Ms. Ho was shown a video footage lasting for about 10 to 15 seconds in which her right foot seemed to have a momentary contact with the buttock of a bank staff. Apparently the footage was shot in a commotion where attempt was made by the bank staff to forcibly remove the protesters. It is understandable that in such circumstances people were jostling against each another and what Ms. Ho was doing then is crucial in establishing the plausibility of the allegation against her.

7. Ms. Ho has a flair for electronic video and audio devices and she has been responsible for filming the public activities of the Alliance almost since the creation of it. When the assault was allegedly taken place, Ms. Ho was actually holding her video device filming the forcible removal of the protesters by the bank staff. Her attention was on the action in front of her and the display screen of her video. It is, to say the least, very unlikely that a person would in the circumstances feel like joining the fray.

8. There is another factor that discounts the truthfulness of the allegation. Ms. Ho is a small, slim young lady whose weight would not be much more than 90 lbs. Could a person with that physique be inclined to provoke a fight? And could a lady like Ms. Ho who has taken part in so many protests relating to the fraud of Lehman Brothers and has always behaved properly, suddenly and without any provocation whatsoever, acted contrary to her personality and disposition? The allegation is so preposterous that no person in his right mind would seriously entertain it. Yet your officers have concluded that the offence is so grave that it justifies a deployment of five officers to carry out a dawn raid for an allegation of common assault where the supposed victim does not seem to have suffered any visible or detectable injury and does not complain for months after the event.

Assault on Law by Abuses of Powers

9. How should the public comprehend a dawn raid by five detectives against a young lady suspected of common assault? Does it not indicate the new low of the state of policing in this city under your watch?
But that is not all in so far as the outrageous police conduct is concerned. For almost one year now Ms. Ho has been the contact person between the police and the Alliance on many occasions especially in respect of application for approval to assemble and conduct procession. Your officers at the Police Community Relations Office in Central District know Ms. Ho well and it would take only a phone call to get Ms. Ho to the Central Police Station to view the video footage and to assist police investigation into the allegation. The differences between asking Ms. Ho to the police station and the dawn raid are that only the latter could inflict the distress, sudden sense of fear, and helplessness on Ms. Ho and her family.

10. The connection between the decision to harass Ms. Ho and another assault complaint against the bank staff at the scene of protest is clear. As mentioned above, the moment when Ms. Ho was accused of committing assault on the anonymous bank staff, she was filming an assault in progress by the bank staff against a protester.
It is hardly surprising that the protester would sustain injury given the way she was man-handled by the bank staff. As it was, she was taken to hospital, and stayed there for days for medical treatment. We also learn that a complaint of assault was lodged with the police by her or subsequently with the medical findings of the injury she sustained. Despite the evidence, no action has been taken against the bank or the assailant by the police, just like other crimes related to the Lehman Brothers fraud.

11. In the circumstances, it is an irresistible inference that the police harassment against Ms. Ho is motivated by the desire to please certain influential individuals affiliated with the bank.

12. The allegation against Ms. Ho is so trivial that she is granted a police bail of HKD100. Against an allegation of common assault that could, technically speaking, be committed by everyone in this crowded community, the police deployed five detectives to conduct a dawn raid on the basis of the flimsiest evidence which comes into being in a commotion caused largely by the bank itself. The commotion would not have happened had the police had the courage and sense of decency to enforce the law. Against the banks for fraud that is proven by documentary evidence that no government official would dare to dispute, not a single officer of yours has the courage to follow your own orders to classify the complaints after almost one year of their lodgments with the Commercial Crime Bureau. Insofar as the Lehman Brothers fraud is concerned, the victims have been deprived of any legal rights and remedies. Would any of the government officials to whom this complaint is addressed care to respond to this latest episode of police abuse of powers?

c.c.
Mr. TANG Ying Yen, Henry, Chief Secretary for Administration
Mr. Wong Yan Lung, Secretary for Justice
Mr. Ian Grenville Cross, Director of Public Prosecutions
Mr. Ian McWalters, Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions
Mr. Lee Ka Chiu, Director of Crime & Security, HKP

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From: An Open letter to the Commissioner of Police regarding to the latest episode of police abuse of powers