When a construction scandal in Hong Kong put two company directors in prison for 12 years in 2000
- Two 31-storey blocks of flats were found to have dangerous foundations, because of short pilings – steel posts driven deep into the ground to support them
- The dangerous corner-cutting led to the blocks being demolished and two company directors and an engineer who was involved being sent to prison
“Construction work on two 31-storey blocks of flats has been suspended in what housing chiefs have described as the latest fraud and corruption racket involving faulty piling,” reported the South China Morning Post on January 9, 2000.
“Piling on the two Home Ownership Scheme blocks […] in Sha Tin was found to be 13 and 10 metres shorter than required. The discovery is the latest in a series of piling defects on sites across the SAR which has sparked a crisis of confidence in Hong Kong’s construction industry.”
“Housing Authority member Daniel Lam Chun said the authority was angry and shocked by the latest scandal […] ‘We will not tolerate any danger to public life because of graft,’ he said.”
On September 4, 2002, the Post reported that “two construction company directors have been jailed for 12 years for their role in a substandard-pilings scam that led to the demolition of two housing blocks in a Sha Tin housing development.
“In the Court of First Instance, Deputy Judge Anthony To Kwai-fung told Chan Kwong-yee, 48, and Tom Yiu Yiu-man, 46, who [ …] were convicted of conspiracy to defraud, that they had put people’s lives at risk and their investment at peril.