Police did not examine all security camera footage tracking Hong Kong teen at campus before she disappeared, officer admits
- Detective Constable Lee Ho-kit tells inquest his team did not have the resources to examine all 300 hours of footage showing Chan Yin-lam’s final day at school
- His investigation only focused on confirming she left the campus unharmed
The police officer in charge of investigating the death of a 15-year-old girl found in Hong Kong waters last year has admitted the force might have overlooked some security footage showing her final hours at her school campus the day she disappeared.
Detective Constable Lee Ho-kit told the Coroner’s Court on Friday he and his colleagues did not check all CCTV video taken from the Hong Kong Design Institute, where Chan Yin-lam was enrolled. The teen went missing on September 19 last year and her body was found off the waters of Tseung Kwan O three days later.
A 30-minute compilation of footage, played in court on Friday, showed Chan spent 70 minutes wandering the school premises before leaving – barefoot – at 7pm. She went to a nearby housing estate and took a 10-minute taxi ride to a construction site near the sea, the court also heard.
Lee, who put the footage together, testified it did not show all of the teen’s behaviour at the campus during the period as parts deemed irrelevant to the investigation were left out.
His team was unable to review all of the approximately 300 hours of footage taken from school cameras due to time constraints, he said, adding officers were only concerned whether she had any accidents that day. The officer concluded she left the school safely that night.