{"id":235176,"date":"2021-10-20T17:54:04","date_gmt":"2021-10-21T00:54:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/?p=235176"},"modified":"2021-10-25T23:53:23","modified_gmt":"2021-10-26T06:53:23","slug":"five-year-prison-terms-for-hong-kong-students-deepen-fears-of-retroactive-use-of-national-security-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2021\/10\/five-year-prison-terms-for-hong-kong-students-deepen-fears-of-retroactive-use-of-national-security-law\/","title":{"rendered":"Five-year Prison Terms for Hong Kong Students Deepen Fears of Retroactive Use of National Security Law"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, five former students of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) were each <\/span>sentenced to almost five years in prison<\/span><\/a> for their involvement in protests against the National Security Law in November 2019. One of the former students remained courageously defiant even in the face of the particularly harsh sentences, which she interpreted as simply <\/span>a means to suppress dissent<\/span><\/a>. While the charges were not levied on violations of the National Security Law itself, recent judicial rulings point to an increasingly retroactive application of the law and a harsher use of existing ones.<\/span><\/p>\n

Selina Cheng at the Hong Kong Free Press described <\/span>the prosecutions of the five former students<\/strong><\/a>:<\/span><\/p>\n

Four men \u2013 Lau Chun-yuk, Ko Chi-pan, Chan Lik-sik and Hui Yi-Chuen \u2013 received prison terms of four years and nine months, while one woman \u2013 Foo Hoi-ching \u2013 was sentenced to four years and 11 months in jail.<\/span><\/p>\n

The five were convicted earlier in September of participating in a riot on November 11, 2019 at CUHK near its No. 2 Bridge \u2013 an overpass at the edge of the campus in Sha Tin, overlooking the Tolo Highway and MTR tracks.<\/span><\/p>\n

[…] Aged between 20 and 23, the five defendants were convicted of one count of rioting and one count of using face covering during an illegal assembly. Two of the defendants were also convicted of possession of offensive weapons or tools for unlawful purposes. [<\/span>Source<\/strong><\/a>]<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The <\/span>judge deliberately chose harsh sentences<\/span><\/a> for the five former CUHK students in order to send a message deterring others from contesting the laws. Brian Wong from the South China Morning Post reported on <\/span>the judge\u2019s severe and controversial ruling<\/strong><\/a>:<\/span><\/p>\n

Tuesday\u2019s ruling marked the second time a judge had handed down prison sentences over intense clashes between hardcore protesters and riot police that gripped the Sha Tin campus at the height of the anti-government unrest in November 2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sentencing the five at West Kowloon Court, Deputy Judge Kathie Cheung Kit-yee said the defendants must have chosen to remain at the scene either to take part in the violence or abet the criminal acts of their comrades.<\/span><\/p>\n

The lack of evidence over the defendants\u2019 level of involvement was no reason to reduce their jail sentences, she said, because all participants in a riot shared the same culpability regardless of their roles in it. [<\/span>Source<\/strong><\/a>]<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Current state of HK\u2019s criminal justice system: \u201cThe lack of evidence over the defendants\u2019 level of involvement was no reason to reduce their jail sentences, [the judge] said\u2026\u201d https:\/\/t.co\/EJ6zF7bF6I<\/a><\/p>\n

— Antony Dapiran (@antd) October 19, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n