Hong Kong police officers jailed for harassing homeless people

HONG KONG – A judge in Hong Kong jailed six police officers on Oct. 17 for harassing homeless people, following a rare criminal conviction for law enforcement in the Chinese financial center.

Judge Kathie Cheung sentenced the police officers to prison terms ranging from 25 to 41 months on multiple charges of “perverting the course of justice.”

The charges relate to a 2020 incident in which officers raided the tents of two homeless Vietnamese men, Nguyen Van Son and Le Van Muoi, and arrested them on suspicion of possessing a knife and illegal drugs.

In a ruling last month, Cheung found that officers had deliberately covered surveillance cameras near the tents.

Footage of the incident showed the empty hands of one of the homeless men during his arrest, contradicting police’s written account that he had illegal drugs in his possession.

“I found that the only reasonable inference is that they had decided to file charges against (Le),” Cheung said in her judgment.

The judge said the officers had “abused their powers… breached public confidence in the police and damaged public confidence in the justice system”.

After his arrest, Le was held in a psychiatric center, where he died.

Homelessness is a growing problem in the wealthy city, with the official number of people living on the streets rising from 595 to 1,470 in the past decade.

According to a 2021 survey, being chased away or having their belongings confiscated were among the top concerns of homeless people, but officials were rarely held accountable. AFP