Hong Kong police accused of waterboarding ‘Dragon Slaying Brigade’ member
- Lawyer of Christian Lee Ka-tin, accused of being part of 2019 bomb plot, says client was also beaten up during interrogation
Station Sergeant Fung Po-law took the witness stand in the High Court on Friday to respond to accusations by brigade member Christian Lee Ka-tin’s defence lawyer that he had slapped Lee, threatened to hang him on a tree and hurt his family if the suspect did not answer interrogators’ questions.
Lee and five other defendants – Cheung Chun-fu, Cheung Ming-yu, Yim Man-him, Lai Chun-pong and Justin Hui Cham-wing – are on trial for their alleged roles in a plot to plant two bombs in Wan Chai during anti-government protests in December 2019, with the police as their targets.
The court heard that Fung led a team of five officers who arrested Lee at his house in the Kwu Tung area of the northern New Territories on June 11, 2020, half a year after the brigade’s leader Wong Chun-keung was arrested.
Wong last month testified in court as a prosecution witness, alleging Lee had obtained a gun from the plot’s other mastermind, Ng Chi-hung, after he joined Ng’s team to test firearms in a suburb in November 2019.
Lee’s lawyer, Priscilia Lam Tsz-ying, accused Fung of intimidating her client during an interrogation by claiming Lee was “pretending” not to know where the gun was, and implying police knew he was lying when Wong had already informed on fellow team members.