3 backstage staff of Hong Kong boy band Mirror concert acquitted after accident
Court clears trio of conspiracy to defraud authorities by understating weight of equipment, including screen that fell and injured two dancers
The District Court on Friday ruled the trio would have “no interest” in getting an overloaded rigging arrangement for the concert approved using deceptive means, as they were only coordinators and technicians of the show who had nothing to gain from the misrepresentations.
The court also found that instead of the false data, it was inferior standards of work, shoddy stage design and an engineer’s negligence in vetting the set-up that were to blame for the collapse of a four-by-four-metre (13-by-13-foot) LED screen at Hong Kong Coliseum on July 28, 2022.
It rejected the prosecution’s claim that the misrepresentations contributed to the accident and indirectly caused financial losses to Music Nation, the concert’s investor.
The accident took place during the fourth performance of what would have been a series of 12 shows.
The collapsed giant screen left dancers Mo Li Kai-yin with severe spinal injuries and Chang Tsz-fung with a fractured pelvis. Li, who is paralysed from the neck down, is still undergoing treatment to regain muscle movement.