Hong Kong’s Court of Appeal has again questioned a written judgement in a civil case by national security judge Wilson Chan, who recently received a “serious reprimand” for plagiarising most of his ruling from the plaintiff in a separate case.
In a hearing concerning real estate giant Great Eagle Holdings on Wednesday, the court said that it would not rely on Chan’s judgement, adding that it involved extensive incorporation of counsel’s submission, Ming Pao reported.
The case concerned an appeal filed by Lo Kai-shui, son of Great Eagle Holdings’ founder, against the trustees of his family’s trust and his brother Lo Ka-shui.
Lo Kai-shui’s side argued that Judge Chan had extensively repeated the submissions made by the trustees and his brother’s team, and questioned whether Chan had exercised independent thought when handling the case, RTHK reported.
Vice President of the Court of Appeal Susan Kwan said the court would give “little to no weight” to Chan’s judgement, according to Ming Pao.
The Great Eagle Holdings case was the second case in recent days in which Chan’s judgement was questioned.
The appeal court last Friday ordered a retrial in another civil case, a trademark dispute, after the defendant appealed on the grounds that Chan had committed “judicial copying.” The defendant said the judge had copied “over 98 per cent” of his judgement from the plaintiff’s case.
Chan, who is one of the city’s handpicked national security judges, received a “serious reprimand” from Chief Judge of the Court of Final Appeal Andrew Cheung, the Judiciary told HKFP on Wednesday.
“[Cheung] thinks that copying is unfair to both the plaintiff and defendant, and it will also affect public confidence in the Judiciary, and is completely unacceptable,” the Judiciary said.
Chan is currently handling the government’s application for an injunction to ban the distribution of pro-democracy protest song Glory to Hong Kong with criminal intent.
The High Court judge dropped out of a landmark national security trial involving 47 democrats, citing health reasons. He was replaced by another judge in the case.
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