Elsie Leung
Elsie Leung Oi Sie GBM JP (Chinese: 梁愛詩, born 1939) was the Secretary for Justice of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region from 1997 to 2005, and was a member of the Executive Council of Hong Kong. She was succeeded by Wong Yan Lung, SC on October 20, 2005.
Career
Elsie Leung was qualified as a solicitor and started her practice in 1968. Before she became the Secretary for Justice, she was a partner of P. H. Sin & Co. and Iu, Lai & Li Solictors. She specialised in divorce cases. Leung has a distinguished record of public service. Before her appointment as Secretary for Justice, she served on various government boards and committees, including the Independent Police Complaints Council, Equal Opportunities Commission, Social Welfare Advisory Committee and Inland Revenue Board of Review. She was also honorary legal adviser to many non-governmental organisations.
Leung was educated in Hong Kong, at Sacred Heart Canossian College (formerly known as Italian Convent School and Sacred Heart School) and the University of Hong Kong. Leung passed her Law Society Qualifying Examinations in 1967 and obtained her LLM degree from the University of Hong Kong in 1988. She is a past President of the International Federation of Women Lawyers.
Leung was a founding member of the pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong ("DAB"). She was appointed as a Delegate of the People's Congress of Guangdong Province in 1989. In 1993, she was appointed as a Delegate of the 8th National People's Congress as well as a Hong Kong Affairs Adviser. In the period leading up to the transfer of sovereignty, Leung advised the Chief Executive (Designate) of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region on legal matters relating to the establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
On July 1, 1997, Leung became the first Secretary for Justice of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. She is the Chief Executive's chief legal adviser and an ex-officio member of the Executive Council. She heads the Department of Justice which has a staff of over 1,000, of whom about 290 are lawyers. She is currently the Chairman of the Law Reform Commission, the Committee on Bilingual Legal System, the Legal Practitioners' Liaison Committee and serves on numerous committees, including the Fight Crime Committee and the Operations Review Committee of the Independent Commission Against Corruption.
As the principal law official of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Leung gives legal advice to all government bureaus and departments, represents the Government in all actions brought by or against it, and is responsible for the conduct of all criminal prosecutions and the drafting of all legislation to be introduced by the Government.
Leung was awarded the Grand Bauhinia Medal in July 2002 for her distinguished public service, and for her significant contributions in ensuring the successful implementation of the new constitutional order under the "One Country, Two Systems" concept.
Controversies
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Seeking Privileges Using Her Own Power and Malicious Prosecution
However, several decisions made by her while she was in office were controversial. The non-prosecution of Sally Aw on the grounds of public interests had jeopardised the rule of law. Further, the decision to prosecute Helen Chung, a former solicitor, for selling her flat by deception was also unreasonable. In 1993, Chung sold her flat in North Point, Hong Kong, to a couple for HK$6.45 million. The solicitors acting for the couple, Kao, Lee & Yip. Kao, Lee & Yip had checked the relevant law and contacted the solicitors involving in the 1988 agreement to obtain confirmation that the earlier agreement between Chung and Sarrayo Investment Co. Ltd. for the sale and purchase of the flat in 1988 had already been terminated before advising the couple to complete the purchase ahead of the proposed registration of a civil action by another intended purchaser, Penlead Development Ltd., whose solicitors were P. H. Sin & Co. (where Leung was then a partner, as there was a note of the UK House of Lords case MEPC Ltd v. Christian Edwards [1981] AC 205 as well as the name of the solicitors' firm representing Chung in the aborted 1988 sale Liu, Chan & Lam on a land search form. The registration of that agreement did not affect the title. The title was thus good. There was therefore no theft or deception on the part of Chung. Nevertheless, Leung decided to charge Chung with the theft of the proceeds of sale and procuring the execution of the cheque by Kao, Lee & Yip by deception. Leung even asked the most senior partner at Kao, Lee & Yip, Emmanuel Kao, who actually handled the conveyancing transaction and was the first person to sign the cheque having found that the 1988 agreement had been terminated, not to give evidence in the court for Chung or he would also be prosecuted and disbarred from practice. The prosecutor, William Tam, also coached the witnesses when they gave evidence in the court so that they would give evidence in the prosecution's favour. Tam asked the prosecution witnesses leading questions on many occasions. As a result, Chung did not have a fair trial. The trial judge, Peter Line, who admitted that he had only little knowledge of property law, finally convicted Chung on the basis of the evidence from two other solicitors, Raymond Chu and Paul Ho (now a Senior Government Counsel at the Department of Justice), who both play only a small role in the transaction and did not have knowledge of all the documents. Chung was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment but was released after a few hours as she had been detained in the US for more than 2 years pending extradition to Hong Kong.
It is also believed that Leung introduced the National Security Bill in 2003 in order to distract the public from Chung's case. Further, as Ambrose Lee Siu Kwong, the then ICAC Commissioner, is a close friend of Chung. There was also a rumour that Regina Ip, the then Secretary for Security, was forced by Leung to resign after the National Security Bill failed.
Tax Evasion and Bribery
Apart from the above malicious prosecution, Leung also helped her former client, Panlead Development Ltd. evade stamp duty by amending the Stamp Duty Ordinance in 1999 to the effect that a cancelled agreement for the sale and purchase of a residential property was no longer subject to stamp duty. In 1992, Chung contracted with Panlead Development Ltd. to sell the above-mentioned flat to Panlead. The solicitors acting for Panlead, P. H. Sin & Co., advised them not to proceed with the purchase and refused to sign the formal agreement on the ground that registration of the 1988 agreement rendered the title bad. Chung therefore forfeited the deposit. P. H. Sin then commenced a civil action on Panlead's behalf against Chung for the return of the deposit and damages. As P. H. Sin did not pay stamp duty on the agreement, the civil action could not be registered against Chung's title. Further, since an agreement for the sale and purchase of a residential property was chargeable to stamp duty under the then s.29C(1) of the Stamp Duty Ordinance (now repealed), the provisional agreement between Chung and Panlead could not thus be used as evidence in the civil action (Stamp Duty Ordinance s.15). P. H. Sin therefore deferred the action until 1998 when Leung became the Secretary for Justice. At the trial, the counsel acting for Chung, Louis Chan (now a District Court Judge) did not inform the judge that since stamp duty had not paid on the agreement, it could not be used as evidence. Instead, he admitted liability contrary to Chung's instructions. As a result, Chung lost the case and was required to return the deposit and pay damages and legal costs. There has been a suspicion that Chan might have offered a bride as an inducement to help Panlead win the case. The counsel acting for Panlead, Kenneth Chow, is a founding member of the DAB and thus a close friend of Leung. The judgment given by Justice Hartmann, who said that he was not familiar with Hong Kong conveyancing law, was based on Chow's submissions to the court.
Asking Witnesses to Lie in Court
Moreover, it has also been suspected that Leung might have asked two Filipino maids, AMIE CAMACHO and LENITA HERNANDEZ previously employed by Chung to give false evidence in a claim against her for unfair dismissal. Chung did not in fact ask the maids to help in her Legislative Council election campaign in 1995. It has been said that it was Leung who planned the trick in order that Tung Chee Hwa, the former Chief Executive, would not nominate Chung Secretary for Justice.