Sreya Kanugula
Mr. Jimmy Lai Chee-Ying, one of the biggest entrepreneurs of Hong Kong, will be put behind bars on the orders of the highest court of Hong Kong. South China Morning Post (SCMP) had reported that he was arrested under the National Security Law on the charges of fraud and collusion with outside foreign sources.
Previously, he had been released by a judge on a bond worth 10 million hong kong dollars.
This was dismissed by Chief Justice Andrew Cheung Kui-Nung in the new ruling stating that the previous order had been a misinterpretation of the National Security Law’s provisions.
He also stated that Mr. Lai may register another application for bail again at the High Court instead of the Court of Final Appeal since the latter lacks the required jurisdiction to take care of his application.
The Next Digital media house founder had been under house arrest since the 23rd of December on the High Court ruling on him stating that he possessed an arguable defence on both his arrest charges and that his absconding wasn’t a likely situation.
Two days before he was sent back to prison on the eve of the new year by the Court of Final Appeal, Mr. Lai had resigned from the position of chairman as well as executive director of Next Digital.
On the possibility of the prosecutors ruled by the Top Court appealing against the Security Law’s Article 42(2) interpretation by the lower court, which criminalised secession, subversion and terrorism acts, the above decision was taken by the mogul.
The specifications of the above clause were that “no bail shall be granted to a criminal suspect or defendant unless the judge has sufficient grounds for believing [they] will not continue to commit acts endangering national security.“
No objection had been raised by the prosecution on Mr. Lai’s bail for the charge of fraud but an argument was made that he must be remanded in custody on the charge of collusion since the aforementioned article of the Security Law suggested that bail must not be provided to defendants related to cases of security law unless other compelling reasons existed.
This was the first case concerned with security law that was tackled by the Court of Final Appeal since its establishment and the imposition of said law by the Centre on the entire city since June 2020.
The previous appeal was heard in front of the bench comprising Chief Justice Cheung, permanent justices Roberto Ribeiro and Joseph Fok, and non-permanent local judges Patrick Chan Siu-oi and Frank Stock.
The hearing wasn’t presided by other overseas judges which was a rare sight for the Top Court’s cases.
Mr. Lai was also one of the first defendants to be granted bail after the imposition of the security law charge and Chinese-run media had criticised this decision with the warning that the case might be taken over by the mainland authorities.
The charges of fraud were laid on Mr. Lai on the 3rd of December along with two other higher executives of New Digital on the allegations of inappropriate usage of the company’s headquarters space at Tseung Kwan O.
Bail was denied to him at that moment. After a week, he had been charged once again on collusion with outside foreign forces in a different case, bail was denied again and was only given after case review by the High Court.
SCMP had reported that both these cases on Mr. Lai were set to report once again on the 16th of April in front of the West Kowloon Court.