Jimmy Lai Occupy entrails attack ‘premeditated insult’
Trio sentenced, but out on bail pending appeal against convictions
The animal entrails attack on Jimmy Lai Chee-ying during the Occupy movement in November 2014 was a premeditated plan to insult the media mogul, a magistrate said on Tuesday as he blasted three men for potentially destroying public peace.
Eastern magistrate Lee Siu-ho’s comments came as he sentenced kitchen worker Chan Kwok-hung, 31, restaurant owner Yip Wing-chi, 44, and businessman Li Siu-lung, 46, to jail terms of between nine and 18 weeks each.
But the trio was soon freed on bail pending appeals against their convictions and sentences, despite the prosecution’s objection.
The case centred on an attack at about 4.30pm on November 12, 2014 when Yip threw bags of animal entrails at Lai, who owns the Apple Daily newspaper, on Harcourt Road in Admiralty. Li filmed the attack.
The magistrate said: “The act of throwing the entrails, in court’s view, was to insult the victim – not only to dirty his clothes but also to leave a psychological impact.”
Lee also noted that it was “obviously a premeditated plan” to assault Lai as Yip delivered the entrails on a cart from the New Territories and was prepared to launch more attacks, had they not been discovered.