District Court #NSL judge Kwok Wai-kin ruled that all 17 articles - though 10 were beyond the 6-month time limit of the sedition offense - are admitted as evidence.
The 17 articles are:
1.Personal feature of @KwaiLamHo as she participated in the primaries
2.Personal feature of @owenchowkashing
3.Personal feature of Fergus Leung
4.Commentary by Chan Pui-man criticising speech crime and sedition offense
5.Commentary by @nathanlawkc entitled “under the new norm of #NSL, how should we resist and keep thinking”
6.Personal feature of @nathanlawkc after he fled to UK
7.Commentary by @nathanlawkc about resilience in a chaotic world
8.Personal feature of @tedhuichifung after he fled Hong Kong
9.Personal feature of @LeungBaggio after he fled Hong Kong
10.Commentary by @SunnyCheungky responding to HK authorities putting him on the #NSL wanted list
11.Commentary by Allan Au about new key words of the year 2020 – “50 years unchanged have mutated, One Country Two Systems are now on intubation and dying”
12.Commentary by Allan Au criticizing judges’ role in show trial
13.Commentary by Allan Au paralleling Hong Kong to white terror period in Taiwan
14.Commentary by Allan Au calling sedition offence a lawfare
15.Commentary by Allan Au saying that #NSL has brought disasters to Hong Kong
16.Feature story about CUHK graduates’ march on campus to mourn the second anniversary of the police-student clash in 2019
17. News write-up of @zouxingtong ’s response to the award of Prominent Chinese Democracy Activist
To round up, 5 names in this 17 articles (Gwyneth, Owen, Fergus, Chan Pui-man, Chow Hang-tung) are in pre-trial detention or jail.
4 (Nathan, Sunny, Ted, Baggio) are in exile.
Allan Au is still in HK under police bail over "sedition".
9 were arrested over the CUHK march.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
#Thread about HK prosecution's opening statement on the #StandNews "conspiracy to publish seditious publications" case.
In the 53-page document, the prosecutor wrote 3 times that the seditious intent in the articles were "self-evident" 不言而喻/不宣而告.
The prosecution said the crux of their case is not about the defendants, namely Best Pencil Ltd, Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam "taking actual actions in accordance with their unlawful agreement", but that they "had reached an unlawful agreement to publish seditious publications"
As said on the first day, the prosecution said they do not have to prove the seditious intent in the defendants; they only have to prove that the defendants were aware of the seditious intent in the articles.
This #thread is about the first day of the trial of #StandNews and its two former chief editors Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam, a case as my colleague @holmeschan_ described that "literally put press freedom on trial".
The 3 defendants, Best Pencil Ltd (#StandNews parent company) , Chung and Lam, were charged of "conspiracy to publish seditious publications", a British colonial offense the carries up to 24 months in jail.
But Chung and Lam has been in pre-trial detention for 10 months because
...sedition is now treated as a national security crime that's not in the #NSL Beijing imposed on HK in mid-2020 and hence bail is usually denied.
Both Chung and Lam have pleaded not guilty to the charge so they won't have 1/3 discount if they are convicted and facing sentence.
“He asked people to keep breathing” - a #thread about today’s mitigation of the now-disbanded #StudentPoliticism members in their #NSL case of “incitement to subversion” and ballooning issue of minimum sentence and PG discount in #NSL cases.
4 members of #StudentPoliticism Wong Yat-chin, Chan Chi-sum, Chu Wai-ying and Wong Yuen-lam, pleaded guilty in July to one count of “conspiracy to incite subversion”, an offence that carries up to 10 years in jail under #NSL. Mitigation began this morning.
Before D1 Wong Yat-chin’s lawyer started, prosecutor Vincent Lee raised in court that Wong’s FB page published a post 3 days ago in which Wong wrote he had no regret. Lee asked Wong’s lawyer to clarify whether Wong was not remorseful - an element to consider for commutation.
#Thread Hong Kong Journalists Association @HKJA_Official chairman Ronson Chan has arrived in West Kowloon Court. He is in a black tee with the Chinese characters of "press freedom" 新聞自由 at his back. Key things to watch are bail and conditions.
Ronson Chan has pleaded not guilty to the charge of obstructing police officers under the Offences Against the Person Ord, which carries up to 2 yrs in jail, and the alternative charge of obstructing a public officer under the Summary Offences Ordi whose max sentence is 6 months.
#JUSTIN Magistrate Peter Law ruled it's unnecessary to restrict Ronson Chan from leaving Hong Kong as part of his bail condition.
#DEVELOPNG Preliminary inquiry of #HKAlliance's "incitement to subversion" case has started this morning. Chow Hang-tung @zouxingtong told the court, "It's impossible to plead guilty. Pursuing democracy is not a crime. I plead not guilty." She is going to give evidence.
The prosecution submitted 58 statements from 39 witnesses, 136 pieces of documentary exhibits and a for now unclear number of video clips to the court as evidence. No witness will be called to court as a condition Chow agreed earlier in order to strike down reporting restriction.
History of June 4 crackdown in 1989 and over 3 decades of commemorations in Hong Kong comes back in vivid images in open court as Chow Hang-tung replays video footage submitted by the prosecution as evidence against the Alliance's alleged "incitement to subversion" offence.
This is a #thread to explain the reporting restrictions removed today and yesterday re the #NSL cases of 47 pro-dem activists "conspiracy to subversion" and of the #HKAlliance "incitement to subversion".
The ban is pursuant to article 87A of the Magistrates Ordinance and hence popularly known as the "87A ban" or simply "87A" in HK.
The ban covers a pre-trial procedure called "committal proceeding" - when a magistrate is supposed to scrutinize the allegation and...
...decides whether the case is fit and ready for proceeding to formal trial. At this stage, a defendant can opt for a "preliminary inquiry" to go through the prosecution's evidence and examine the witnesses. If a defendant wins a PI, the case will be thrown out of court.