Hong Kong police arrest 16 over bar fight murder

Police have arrested 16 people over the killing of a 32-year-old businessmen during a Tsim Sha Tsui bar fight.

Kowloon City Magistrates’ Courts. File photo: Hans Tse/HKFP.

The police initially arrested nine men and three women aged between 24 and 52 in connection with the July 26 bar fight which left a beauty consultant dead. Eight of them were charged with murder or assisting offenders, according to a Wednesday statement.

In the latest development, four more men were arrested and each charged with one count of murder. Lai Wing-lam, 29; Lee Man-tai, 33; Yung Wai-kin, 31; and Thai national Jacky Masanthiah, 26, stand accused of murdering Yeung at the Tsim Sha Tsui bar together with other suspects.

The four appeared before Acting Principal Magistrate Cheng Lim-chi at the Kowloon City Magistrates’ Courts on Thursday and were remanded after they did not apply for bail, while their defence lawyers said they would need surveillance footage of the incident.

Their next scheduled court appearance is on October 29.

An investigation by the Regional Anti-triad Unit of Kowloon West is underway.

Bar fight

Court hearings for the cases took place over the past week. The victim, Issac Yeung, was at a friend’s birthday party at Club Revel, an upstairs bar in Tsim Sha Tsui, when an argument broke out.

The Hong Kong Police Force emblem outside the police headquarters in Wan Chai. File photo: Candice Chau/HKFP.

It is alleged that several men attacked Yeung and left him unconscious with severe head trauma, including skull fractures and internal bleeding of the brain.

Despite receiving emergency brain surgery, Yeung remained in a critical condition for six days until he was eventually pronounced dead on July 31, prompting the police to reclassify the case as murder.

One of the murder suspects, Tsang Wai-ching, was brought to the Kowloon City court on Wednesday. He was remanded in custody and will appear in court again on Saturday.

Cheng Yuk-lun, 52, also appeared in court over allegedly assisting an offender by arranging getaway vehicles for Tsang. Cheng was denied bail and is scheduled to appear in court again along with other defendants on October 29.

A 36-year-old truck driver was also arrested and accused of providing a getaway vehicle in the same case, with the intent to obstruct Tsang’s arrest or prosecution.

The penalty murder in Hong Kong is life imprisonment.