Alice Chan Shook-man, senior assistant director of public prosecutions of the Hong Kong Department of Justice (DoJ), who was put on the proposed sanction list by a US bi-partisan group, has resigned, amid speculation of evading U.S. sanctions. To counter that, the DoJ said that Ms. Chan resigned in September 2023 before the sanction list was out.
However, a review of the sequence of events indicates that the DoJ’s statement was inconsistent with the facts. Ms. Chan’s name had already appeared on the list of people recommended for sanction in the report issued by the Congress and Executive Committee on China (CECC) on July 12, 2023.
Samuel Phillip Bickett, an American lawyer who was accused of “assaulting a police officer” and sentenced to jail during the “anti-extradition movement,” posted an article on his social networking site X (formerly called Twitter) on March 1, quoting an internal email from the DoJ. It said that Ms. Alice Chan Shook-man, who had served in the DoJ for 28 years, had resigned, becoming the first target of sanctions to resign after the introduction of the Hong Kong Sanctions Act.
Mr. Bickett said that he did not know the reason for Ms. Chan’s resignation or the exact date of it. However, since she had already resigned, was only involved in one well-known political prosecution, and was not a major perpetrator, there is a compelling argument for removing her name from the list of sanction targets. He also encouraged all co-sponsors of the bill to support removing Ms. Chan’s name from the list.
Report Recommended Sanctioning 16 People
Ms. Chan resigned before September 2023, Mr. Bickett thus cited the CECC report published on July 12, 2023, which already included Chan’s name. He later showed VOA an email he obtained that was sent by Ms. Chan to her colleagues on Jan. 15, 2024, which stated that it was her last working day.A fact-check of the CECC’s 12-page report titled “Hong Kong Prosecutors Play a Key Role in Carrying Out Political Prosecution,” found that it recommended sanctioning 16 people. The report mentioned that since June 2019, the DoJ has prosecuted at least 2,944 people related to rallies, including demonstrators, journalists, civil society workers, and pro-democracy politicians. All of these actions constitute human rights violations.
The report mentioned that nine prosecutors, including Ms. Chan, were involved in handling political cases to varying degrees. In addition to Ms. Chan, it also includes Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecution Derek Lai Kim-wah; seven others ranking from senior prosecutors to prosecutors: Crystal Chan Wing-sum, Cherry Chong Man-yan, Wilson Lam Yi-yeung, Edward Lau Wan-cheung, Vincent Lee Ting-wai, Karen Ng Ka-yuet, and Jennifer Tsui Sin-chi.
‘The Hong Kong Sanctions Act’ Is Ready for Review
On Nov. 2, 2023, members of both parties in the U.S. Congress jointly proposed a bill, the “Hong Kong Sanctions Act,” to sanction Hong Kong officials, and named a total of 49 judges and prosecutors involved in the “Hong Kong National Security Law (NSL).” In addition to Mr. Paul Lam and Ms. Alice Chan, there are also a number of judges designated to handle NSL cases, such as Judge of the Court of First Instance of the High Court, Ms. Esther Toh Lye-ping, District Court Judge Stanley Chan Kwong-chi, District Court Judge Kwok Wai-kin, among others.Alice Chan in Charge of the Prosecution of Lam Cheuk-ting
On Nov. 2, 2023, members of both parties in the U.S. Congress jointly proposed the Hong Kong Sanctions Act, a bill to sanction Hong Kong officials. Alice Chan was on the list of 49 people named.Ms.Chan handled the case of Lam Cheuk-ting, a former Democratic Party legislator, alleged of disclosing the case of Yau Nai-keung, the police superintendent of the “7.21” incident in Yuen Long, who was being investigated by the ICAC. On behalf of the government, Ms. Chan prosecuted Mr. Lam for three counts of “disclosing the identity of a person under investigation.” During court deliberations, she criticized Mr. Lam’s behavior as undermining the ICAC investigation. Lam was found guilty in January 2022 and sentenced to four months in prison.
Mr. Lam appealed against the decision. In November 2023, Ms. Chan continued as the DoJ prosecutor in Lam’s appeal case. Regarding the argument that the appellant’s disclosure of Mr. Yau Nai-keung was being investigated for the crime of “misconduct in public office,” and should not be treated as an offense under the Prevention of Bribery Ordinance and therefore is immune from the charges in this case, Ms. Chan refuted and insisted that Mr. Lam had committed a crime the moment it was disclosed, regardless.
American Lawyer Convicted of Assaulting a Police Officer and Deported
Mr. Bickett, the American lawyer who exposed Ms. Chan’s resignation, was accused of attacking Mr. Yu Shu-sang, an off-duty police officer chasing a man at the Causeway Bay MTR station in December 2019 during the anti-extradition movement. At that time, he was alleged to have snatched his baton, beat the off-duty police officer on the face, and stamped on his belly. He was eventually convicted of assaulting a police officer and sentenced to four and a half months in jail. He was later released on bail and appealed to the High Court, but the appeal was rejected. He subsequently revoked his bail and went to jail immediately for six weeks.On March 22, 2022, Mr. Bickett was released from prison after serving his sentence and was deported that day.
He later appealed to the Court of Final Appeal, however, his appeal was finally rejected in May 2022.
Bickett Accused Hong Kong of Judicial System Collapse After Returning to the US
In July 2022, Mr. Bickett attended the CECC testimony titled “The Dismantling of Hong Kong’s Civil Society,” and used his own experience to explain the collapse of Hong Kong’s judicial system.He said that during the period when he was detained by the Hong Kong police for questioning, the room was just two degrees Celsius (36 degrees Fahrenheit). He also revealed that the first prosecutor who managed his case told him that the police put pressure on his boss in the DoJ to prosecute him. The fact that he was a foreigner and he embarrassed the police in front of the camera was another reason. The prosecutor was subsequently replaced, and his case was taken by another prosecutor.
Mr. Bickett described Hong Kong’s judicial system as having been corrupted by Beijing’s authoritarian rule and said that it could no longer function independently.
