ICAC officer denies seeing letter

Destroyed call intercept 'may have been crucial'

A top graft-fighting officer yesterday denied having seen a letter requesting that intelligence from intercepted phone calls be preserved, in connection to a case of perverting the course of justice.

Daniel So Ping-hung, who headed a taskforce set up by the Independent Commission Against Corruption to investigate the case, admitted at least one of the calls specified in the letter could have contained evidence crucial to the investigation.

The conversation on July 11, 2004 was between Mandy Chui Man-si, one of the four defendants in the perversion-of-justice case, and Becky Wong Pui-see, who had been arrested in connection with a corruption investigation.

The prosecution says Ms Wong, a secretary at Semtech International Holdings, told Chui on the phone that she was safe and sound. But the defence has argued that the secretary was acting under duress, secretly phoning Chui and in a shaky voice while in ICAC custody.

A letter sent to one of the defendants, solicitor Andrew Lam Ping-cheung, in August 2004 claimed that the ICAC was denying certain phone calls had been made. Lam wrote to then chief executive Tung Chee-hwa a week later asking for assurance that materials - including those concerning the July 11 call - be preserved.

The Chief Executive's Office forwarded his letter to the ICAC, and records show it was received by the commissioner on August 18.