Lawyers for former media owner Jimmy Lai have asked a Hong Kong court to grant him a lighter sentence on account of his age and poor health. But the panel of three judges raised doubts about whether his condition warranted any reduction in the mandatory sentence he faces of between 10 years and life imprisonment.
The 78-year-old was convicted last month on two counts of colluding with foreign forces under the National Security Law imposed on Hong Kong by Beijing in 2020. The judges found that he used his influence, and the Apple Daily newspaper which he owned, to try to bring down the Chinese Communist Party and encouraged foreign intervention and sanctions against the authorities in Beijing and Hong Kong.
Mr Lai appeared relaxed as he sat in the dock behind glass for the sentencing hearing, clasping his fists as he greeted friends and family who came to the court for his mitigation hearing. His family said he did not write a letter to the court pleading for mitigation but his defence counsel Robert Pang pointed out that a harsh sentence would fall heavily on a man of such advanced years.
“A prison sentence would bring him much closer to the end of his life,” he said.
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Mr Lai has been in detention for five years and he is serving a sentence for other convictions that are not covered by the National Security Law. Mr Pang said the fact that Lai has been in solitary confinement for most of his time behind bars amounts to an additional burden for him.
But the judges said it was Mr Lai’s own choice to be held apart from other prisoners, he had made repeated requests to be in solitary confinement and had to demonstrate every month that he was fit to continue it. Justice Esther Toh compared the defence counsel’s argument to a husband choosing a single room over sharing a bedroom with his wife, then claiming it amounts to “torture”.
Mr Pang said Lai suffers from hypertension, diabetes, cataracts and a blocked vein in the eye, and he complained that prison authorities only gave him heavily redacted medical notes for his client. The defence counsel cast doubt on the prison authorities’ claim that Mr Lai had gained weight during his detention, pointing to photographs of him looking heavier during earlier court appearances.
“The images lived up to his nickname Fatty Lai. I think he can no longer be called Fatty Lai”, Mr Pang said.
But Justice Toh said the court could not accept estimates of weight based on visual recollection.
“We don’t rely on our eyes, Mr Pang. We all know how you may look fatter on camera. That’s why all the movie stars have to go on a heavy diet to appear slim,” she said.
Hong Kong retains a common law system but the National Security Law was drafted in Beijing and passed by the National People’s Congress, the top legislative body in mainland China. The law sets strict sentencing bands which are mandatory, but the court also applies common law sentencing principles.
Earlier, a barrister representing one of Mr Lai’s former associates who pleaded guilty said he expected 15 years to be the baseline for sentencing those convicted. He said he thought the court would give Mr Lai, as the “mastermind” behind the offences, a harsher sentence and others who played a more peripheral role to be given less time in prison.
