Hong Kong man cleared of murdering his father after new jury accepts manslaughter plea
Manslaughter plea accepted in 'sad and tragic' case which saw father die in drunken assault
A son previously convicted of murdering his father in a row after a drunken night out was yesterday told he would be out of jail soon after a retrial jury earlier accepted his guilty plea to manslaughter in a case the judge called "sad and tragic".
Chan Chung-fai, 42, was sentenced to three years and four months in prison yesterday. But because he has been locked up since his original conviction for murder in 2013, he will be eligible for early release shortly.
Sitting in the Court of First Instance, Mrs Justice Judianna Barnes Wai-ling told the defendant he would be a free man soon. She accepted it was the effects of alcohol that turned "a gentle man into an aggressive one". But she told him he was still responsible for the consequences of drinking so much.
"You took away the life of another human being, the life of your father," the judge said. "I just hope that [you] never drink again," she told Chan, who wept as his counsel read his mitigation.
The court earlier heard that Chan, a shipping clerk, had been drinking at a company party on the night of January 13, 2012. A friend took him home to Wong Tai Sin, and left him with his father, Chan Ping-kwong.
About an hour later, the defendant's mother returned home to find her husband unconscious in "a pool of blood" on the floor. Metres away was her son, asleep in his bed wearing a blood-stained shirt and socks.
The retrial was ordered after the Court of Final Appeal ruled the judge in his 2013 trial erred in failing to give the jury the option of finding the defendant guilty of manslaughter rather than murder. The new jury voted by a 5-2 majority to find Chan not guilty.
The judge reminded the court yesterday that the father's face was hit so hard his facial features became flattened. Chan Chung-fai broke a stool assaulting his father, picked up another and continued the attack. Chan Ping-kwong's broken arm was evidence that he tried to ward off his son, the judge said.
Alex Ng Ching-wong, for Chan, said in mitigation that his client was a kind man who helped his friends, a point to which the judge agreed.
Chan once helped look after the parents of a friend who had been posted to the mainland for several years, the court heard.
Another friend, whom the judge recalled seeing every day during the trial, wrote to say that the defendant had stuck with him even after he contracted a viral infection that left him with difficulty walking and speaking.
The judge said Chan had otherwise been good to his parents, whom he supported financially.
The incident, she added, would weigh heavily on Chan's conscience and scar him for the rest of his life.
She accepted Chan's remorse as genuine.
