The High Court found former TVB general manager Stephen Chan Chi-wan and his assistant Edthancy Tseng Pei-kun guilty of bribery on Monday morning after a successful second appeal by the Department of Justice (DoJ).
Judge Wally Yeung Chun-kuen said that the trial judge had erred in his ruling and that there was no factual or legal basis to show that the defendants had a reasonable excuse in their actions.
Chan and Tseng were convicted of conspiracy to accept an advantage as an agent. The case will be remitted to the District Court, which will hand down the sentence. This was the second appeal by the DoJ, with the pair having been twice previously acquitted of the charges.
The pair were charged with corruption and fraud after receiving HK$112,000 for a 2009 event at the Olympian City shopping mall in Tai Kok Tsui—a payment which Chan failed to disclose to his then employer, TVB. District Court Judge Poon Siu-tung handed down a “not guilty” verdict to the pair in 2011.
The DoJ subsequently appealed the verdict, saying that Poon had failed to show sufficient grounds for acquitting them. The case was sent back to Poon for reconsideration in 2013, but he had stood by his original verdict. The DoJ then appealed again.
