A FACTORY director was yesterday fined $80,000 after Sha Tin Court heard he had allowed heavy metal and cyanide to be discharged into Tolo Harbour and Channel Water Control Zone. Wong Chau-shing, formerly of Wang San Metal Plating Factory, admitted discharging matters other than domestic sewage on September 18, last year. Wong told the court the factory had closed on March 15, and he was now a director of another electro-plating factory in China. After hearing that Wong had a previous conviction for a similar offence, Magistrate Mr Jonathan Acton-Bond ordered the $80,000 fine. The maximum fine for a second conviction is $200,000. Mr Acton-Bond said: ''This is a small earth. If everyone starts putting zinc and cyanide into the ocean, what will happen?'' He told Wong, who was brought before the court on a summons, rather than more serious criminal charge: ''This kind of offence cannot be tolerated in any society nowadays. ''People who are prepared for their own commercial reasons to allow such poisonous concoctions of metals to be released into the water courses are committing graver offences than most of the criminals I have to deal with. ''In your case, you have at least pleaded guilty and accepted the facts.''
