The former crown counsel, guilty of failing to disclose a 1975 conviction, also has a history of depression
A judge yesterday described a senior government lawyer as 'a tragic woman' after she was convicted of failing to divulge a decades-old shop-lifting conviction in order to secure her job.
In finding Gloria Au Yuen-wah, 45, guilty of obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception, Judge John Saunders nevertheless questioned why the former crown counsel, who has a long history of depression and kleptomania and once tried to kill herself, was prosecuted.
'I do not know why it was brought before me and brought before the courts,'' Judge Saunders said moments after recording the conviction in the District Court. 'This is a tragic woman and it is likely she will be [forced] out of the civil service. But having been brought before me, I am obliged to deal with it.'
He adjourned sentencing until August 6 for a community services report.
The case was not the first time that Au's kleptomania has thrown her into the public spotlight. In August 2001, Au was arrested for stealing a $250 handbag from Marks & Spencer in Queen's Road, Central. Later that day she was sent to hospital suffering a drug overdose.
In April last year, Director of Public Prosecutions Grenville Cross decided to drop the charges after seeing psychiatric and other medical reports and concluding it was 'not in the interests of justice' to pursue the case.
