Ho’s trial resumes with focus on agarwood artworks

Following the end of the Chinese New Year Holiday, Macau’s Court of Final Appeal returned yesterday to the trial of the city’s former top prosecutor, Ho Chio Meng, to conduct its 16th session.

Six witnesses, including some prosecutors currently working at the Public Prosecutions Office (MP) who had also served under Ho, were called to provide their testimonies.

In the morning, MP Assistant Prosecutor Vong Vai Va was the first to be called to the stand. He told the court his knowledge of a specific case, one among thousands of accusations against Ho.

In particular, the court focused on agarwood pieces, which were originally seized by the Macau Customs Service (SA) and placed under the jurisdiction of the MP. These items were later found in Ho’s office, as well as a variety of other locations.

Vong Vai  Va  claimed   that Ho  –
through the former Chief of Office of the Prosecutor General of the MP , Lai Kin Ian – had instructed Vong to study whether the agarwood case involved criminal elements, and to retrieve some of the wood in order to test it.

Vong said he had not suspected Ho of any ulterior motives because, in the past, it was normal for the MP to undertake such investigations.

Vong added that he had gone to the 16th floor of the Hotline Center building accompanied by prosecutor Ip Son Sang, where they found some of the agarwood in Ho Chio Meng’s office. 

At the time, Ho was under investigation by the Commission Against Corruption (CCAC). He subsequently delivered two bags of agarwood to Ip Son Sang.

The second witness, Wu Hio, has been a prosecutor since 2000. Wu was responsible for one of the two cases relating to the agarwood.

According to Wu, he had been assigned to deal with a case involving a tonne of agarwood. Wu, like Vong, said that it was typical for the MP to retrieve large numbers of agarwood pieces for investigation in similar cases, even when Customs would say that the case was simply about administrative infractions.

Wu added that, as the person in charge of the case, he had never signed any document that would have allowed someone to remove agarwood pieces from the confiscation site. He affirmed that anyone who wanted to remove any pieces would have had to secure his approval.

At the time, some MP staff told Wu that certain individuals had taken some of the seized agarwood out of storage, although Wu claimed he had never believed these comments.

Wu said it was only when he visited the Hotline Center with Ip Son Sang and other MP staff that he realized that some of the agarwood had indeed been removed.

According to Wu, it was eventually determined that Ho himself had taken out the wood.

However, Wu noted that Ho had never once admitted to having been the one who had taken the agarwood pieces.

Wu also told the judge that the former top prosecutor had never lodged any formal paperwork to ensure his participation in the agarwood case.

When the morning trial finished, Ho claimed that he did not know the agarwood cases were associated with criminal elements, and that was the reason he requested the Customs service forward the wood to MP. He also said the agarwood pieces he returned had mixed fake items with real ones.

He also pointed out that the real pieces could not be sold and must be destroyed unless they are used for exhibitions or educational purposes.

During the trial, Wu mentioned that Ho talked to Ip Son Sang alone.

In response to this Ho said “I will not disclose what I talked about with Ip Son Sang. It would be better if he is willing to [testify] for me.”

Ho added that the agarwood cases were complicated.

The session resumed at 3 p.m. in the afternoon with four more witnesses called to the stand, including another person to whom Ho handed some agarwood pieces. This person had also transported the agarwood artworks from the MP storage to Ho.

The third witness, who was also responsible for the agarwood confiscations, said he had found it abnormal that confiscated material had been taken out of MP storage.

He said he had always asked individuals to return items and affirmed that unless people are investigating related cases, they should not be granted access to the apprehended material no matter their official rank.

The witness also claimed that he reported the absence of the seized material to his higher official, Vong Vai Va, right after the MP saw changes in its leadership.

The last witness, Leong Weng Tak, the chief of the division of judiciary and technician department at the MP, was the individual who removed the agarwood from the MP storage on two occasions (Ho allegedly obtained the agarwood pieces oin both cases).

Leong said that it was Lai Kin Ian who had instructed him to retrieve the agarwood, and that Ho told him to bring the wood to the MP office on the 16th floor of the Hotline Center.

Leong claimed that Ho Chio Meng had never told him to pick up a specific kind of wood, although he said he was given a specific figure for the number of pieces he should bring to Ho. Leong told the judge that when he obtained the wood for Ho, he did not believe that Ho was breaking the law.

Leong revealed he had visited the Hotline Center’s “Teachers’ Training Room “fewer than 20 times.

However, when asked by Ho’s lawyer whether or not he was familiar with several individuals – including the names of prosecutors from Guangdong province and judiciary officials from Beijing – Leong admitted to knowing most of the people, despite never having seen them in the Teachers’ Training Room.

When the afternoon session finished, Ho said that Leong did not provide the whole story regarding the questions he was asked.

“The 16th floor is a place everyone tries to avoid,” commented Ho.

The former top prosecutor reiterated the difficulty of finding people to testify for him, saying he had “trouble” finding willing witnesses.