Banks to be probed in local pair's money laundering
Judge orders police to find out why defendant was not allowed to open accounts
A High Court judge has ordered police to investigate why banks refused to open accounts for a man who has since pleaded guilty to laundering HK$2.2 billion over three months as he considers sentences for the man and a co-defendant.
Chan Tsz-yin, 53, and his cousin Wong Lan-chun, 70, have admitted three counts of dealing with property known or believed to represent the proceeds of an indictable offence.
Chan, a remittance agent, was unable to open his own bank accounts and asked Wong to start a company and open a bank account, prosecutor Susanna Ku Pui-fong said yesterday.
Wong registered a garment trading company, Shun Fat, and opened three accounts with Bank of China (Hong Kong), through which the money was laundered from January 1 to March 3, 2010, the court heard.
Chan admitted to police under caution that a "boss" on the mainland would pay the cousins HK$7,000 per month for using the firm to carry out remittance business, Ku said.
Chan claimed to have no knowledge of the funds' depositors and sources of money, saying all transactions were ordered by the boss, the prosecutor said.
Lawyers for Wong, who is married with three children, said in mitigation that he was in great shock when he learned an "astronomical figure" of HK$2.2 billion had been laundered through the accounts. The money included Hong Kong dollars, US dollars and euros.