Hong Kong police inspector forged supervisor’s signature to visit Colombian woman in prison, court told
- Former anti-triad inspector on trial at Eastern Court charged with two counts each of possessing and using a false instrument
- Cheung Ka-lok denies faking approval for private visits, his lawyer says detainee was an unregistered informant
A senior policeman forged the signature of his supervisor to twice visit a detained woman who claimed to be his girlfriend, a court heard on Monday.
Organised Crime and Triad Bureau inspector Cheung Ka-lok, 43, allegedly faked the signature of senior inspector Ho Wai-man to gain entry to Tai Lam Centre for Women, where Columbian woman Paola Andrea Galvis Silva was remanded.
Prosecutor Fanny Wong Kam-hing told Eastern Court that Cheung visited Silva more than three times in 2017, but with a false memo of request purportedly signed by Ho on at least two of those occasions.
The court heard the memo allowed Cheung to meet Silva in the form of an official visit, which permitted police officers to have barrier-free, one-on-one meetings with detainees for an unlimited length of time for each visit, in contrast to a social visit where detainees can only meet their families via a glass window for at most 15 minutes every time.
Cheung pleaded not guilty to two counts each of possessing and using a false instrument.
At trial, Wong said Silva was sent to Tai Lam Centre on January 4, 2017, for charges relating to a credit card fraud case. She was released on bail on February 22 the same year, but was remanded in custody again on November 16 for failing to comply with bail terms.
Wong said Cheung, then an inspector at Wan Chai’s Regional Anti-Triad Unit, paid official visits to Silva on January 11 and January 25 that year under the false authorisation of Ho. The meetings lasted nearly 2½ hours in total.
Ma Lai-sa, assistant officer at the Correctional Services Department, told deputy magistrate Vivian Wong Wing-man she found Cheung suspicious after spotting him making a social visit to Silva on December 20.
Remembering the defendant had paid official visits before, she filed a report to her superior, which led to Cheung’s arrest on February 5, 2018.
Ho, then the commanding officer of the unit, said he had never signed the two memos of request to grant Cheung official access to the custodial facility. He said he would have started an inquiry and issued a warning had he knew Cheung made an unauthorised official visit to meet Silva.
“My signature doesn’t go in that form. I can recognise how I’ve signed,” he told the magistrate.
But defence lawyer Chan Pak-kong said Silva was in fact an unregistered informant who had been cooperating with Cheung in relation to a drug trafficking investigation.
Police apologise for tear-gassing pharmacy, restaurant during Hong Kong protests
Quoting two investigation reports, Chan said Silva confirmed her support for that inquiry during the January 11 meeting. In the subsequent meeting two weeks later, the defence lawyer said, Silva told the defendant that a Pakistani man had been selling cocaine in entertainment facilities in Tsim Sha Tsui, Central and Wan Chai.
Chan said Ho had been informed of both reports on the same day the meetings were respectively conducted, but Ho said he had “no memory” in relation to the woman nicknamed “Paola” in the reports.
Ho added the lead offered in the reports was “not very useful” since it lacked crucial information such as the time the offence would be carried out, methods used by the perpetrators and information about the accomplices.
Couples putting off their toasts after saying ‘I do’ amid protests
Chan alleged that Ho denied signing the memos either to distance himself from the defendant or to frame him, to avoid liability, knowing that false documents had come to light. Ho denied both accusations.
The trial is expected to last two days.
