Lawyer for alleged Hong Kong bomb plot member slams ‘unreliable evidence’ from prosecutors
- Lawyer also urges jury to disregard confession from client Christian Lee over claims alleged ‘Dragon Slaying Brigade’ member was waterboarded
A defence lawyer for an alleged member of a thwarted 2019 bomb plot that targeted Hong Kong police has argued that prosecutors resorted to unreliable evidence from two witnesses and investigators to level false accusations against her client.
In her closing statement for the High Court trial, barrister Priscilia Lam Tsz-ying also urged the jury to disregard a verbal confession from her client Christian Lee Ka-tin, a suspected core member of the “Dragon Slaying Brigade”, during a police investigation over allegations he was waterboarded and beaten by officers after his arrest in 2020.
The lawyer argued that some of the previous evidence from her client was the result of investigators fabricating information to align with the prosecution’s case, including testimony from Wong Chun-keung, a leader of the bomb plot.
“Did Lee tell the truth in the [interview] with police? You can decide whether he had to lie in the interview in accordance with the version which police had come up with,” she said.
Lee is among six men who have denied involvement in the plot to set off bombs in Wan Chai on December 8, 2019. He also faces a separate charge of possessing arms or ammunition with intent to endanger life.
Prosecutors previously alleged Lee’s role in the plot had included possessing a firearm that received from plot mastermind Ng Chi-hung for weapons testing along with Ng’s team at a suburb in November 2019.