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SCMP Reporter

With the future of the director of public prosecutions in question, and Friday's retirement of one of the deputy directors,  two of the remaining three deputies are obvious contenders to take over the top position.
Of those two, Arthur Luk Yee-shun SC,  57, has been in the post by far the longest.
He is a veteran trial advocate in charge of the Department of Justice's trial advocacy division. 
One of his more prominent trials was the prosecution of seven right-of-abode seekers  involved in the fatal Immigration Tower  fire in 2001.
Luk is also known for his promotion of the Chinese language in criminal proceedings.
He has helped edit the first Butterworths Hong Kong English-Chinese Legal Dictionary  and the China Law Reports,  and is a member of the Committee on the Bilingual Legal System.  
Luk joined the attorney general's  chambers in 1985, and was made a senior counsel in 2002 in the same session that a young Wong Yan-lung, now the secretary of the Justice Department,  was also made senior counsel.
Luk can still be frequently found in the High Court prosecuting the city's more serious crimes and he is now assisting at the inquest into the shooting of a Nepali man by a policeman.
Since Kevin Zervos SC  is to be the de facto number two, that leaves Ian McWalters SC  as the other likely candidate for DPP.
The two are known to have a close working partnership, with similar backgrounds in prosecution and good relationships with the law enforcement agencies.
Both have considerable experience assisting the Independent Commission Against Corruption;  McWalters  is head of the subdivision  that advises the ICAC.
Zervos, 55, remains a candidate for the top job in the future. A native of Melbourne, he began practising in Australia specialising in criminal and commercial law.
From 1984 he was the senior assistant director of the Melbourne and Sydney offices of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions  and was in charge of the major fraud sections.
In 1989, he was appointed general counsel to the commission against corruption of New South Wales, before joining Hong Kong's Attorney General's Chambers - now the Department of Justice -  in 1992.
Known for his passionate advocacy, Zervos was approached to join a private chambers, so his decision to stay with the department has been seen as an indication he is expecting to play a more significant role in time.
He previously oversaw the appeals unit as well as giving advice on issues involving the Basic Law and bill of rights.
He often appears in court in cases where law enforcement actions have been challenged by civil rights arguments.
McWalters, 58, worked in the Papua New Guinea Public Solicitor's Office  for five years before arriving as a Crown  counsel in the then Attorney General's Chambers in Hong Kong in 1985.
He has published a book on bribery and corruption law in Hong Kong; the 579-page tome traces the development of graft-fighting laws in Hong Kong, details the structure, jurisdiction and operations of the ICAC, and examines cases and sentencing.
McWalters was appointed senior counsel in 2005 and is a frequent speaker at international conferences, specialising combating corruption.
McWalters no longer appears so frequently in court.
But before taking on his current senior position, where he issues legal advice behind the scenes, McWalters prosecuted a number of corruption cases arising from ICAC investigations.



Legal top guns who are vying for position