The ICAC has been accused of breaching legal professional privilege when its officers obtained information from a suspect about the legal advice given by her lawyer.
Defence counsel Joseph Tse Wah-yuen SC applied to District Court Judge Joseph Yau Chi-lap for a permanent stay of proceedings before prosecutor Juliana Chow began to open her case yesterday.
Legal professional privilege protects all communications between lawyers and their clients from being disclosed without the permission of the client.
Yesterday's case involves three former senior executives of a Hong Kong-based innovative design company, Mah Pat, 54, former executive chairman and designer of Daka Designs; Raymond Chow Yiu-man, 56, former chief executive of Daka Designs; and Kevin Leung Kwok-wah, 46, the company's former chief financial controller. The three were charged by the Independent Commission Against Corruption with conspiracy to defraud in relation to the company's listing in Singapore. But no plea has been taken.
Tse, who represented Raymond Chow, said ICAC officer Jason See Chiu-kwan, who interviewed one of the suspects, Wong Yuet-ying, who has become a prosecution witness, had taken note of what Wong had mentioned about the legal advice she had received from her lawyer. The content of this had even become part of the ICAC statement, the court was told.
The defence counsel said the legal advice and the conversation with the lawyer, which had been disclosed to the ICAC, would affect his client. Tse argued that See should have known that doing so could risk the case being dropped, as the ICAC had faced similar legal challenges in the past. The lawyer said See should have stopped or warned Wong not to disclose the content of the legal advice during the interview. See, who testified yesterday, said Wong was arrested in September 2007. A year later, Wong was interviewed by the ICAC, which had obtained as many as 10 statements from her mainly due to some 'inconsistencies' about what she had told the ICAC.
Cross-examined by Tse, See said he was not aware the information given by Wong would constitute any breach of legal professional privilege. See said he had also raised the concern with his supervisor later.
