Hong Kong judge accused of bias over jailing of 62-year-old who assaulted police officer cleared of any wrongdoing
- Principal Magistrate Don So accused of favouring police in relation to case involving 62-year-old man last May
- Judiciary report says that just because some members of the public disagreed with sentencing, it did not mean judge was biased
A Hong Kong judge accused of bias has been cleared of any wrongdoing after an investigation by the city’s judiciary.
In May last year, Principal Magistrate Don So Man-lung sentenced an elderly man to six months in jail for assaulting an officer and another person, but that decision was overturned on appeal and the sentence reduced to three weeks.
Don So was accused of favouring police with his ruling, but in a report released on Wednesday, the judiciary said it was satisfied that there was no “impropriety in the judicial conduct of the principal magistrate [Don So Man-lung]”.
“Although [Don So’s] judicial decision was overturned by the Court of First Instance on appeal, this is not to be equated with a finding of bias in his judicial conduct,” the report said.
The accusation of bias stemmed from a case in 2020, when Do So sentenced 62-year-old Chung Chi-wah to six months in prison for injuring an officer and bystander in June the year before while drunk.
