Paint was poured over the door and windows at the offices of two Eastern district councillors in the early hours of today
CLIFFORD LO
CLIFFORD.LO@SCMP.COM
PUBLISHED : Monday, 09 November, 2015, 3:36pm
UPDATED : Monday, 09 November, 2015, 4:32pm
Christopher Chung Shu-kun’s office was targeted. Photo: Edward Wong
Red paint was poured over the door and windows at the offices of two Eastern district councillors in Hong Kong in the early hours of today.
Crime squad officers are investigating whether the two separate reports of criminal damage, made within six hours of each other, are linked. So far, no one has been arrested.
The office of Eastern district councillor Alice Lam Chui-lin on the ground floor of Sui Keung House at Siu Sai Wan Estate in Chai Wan was targeted at about 12.30am.
“Red paint was poured on the window and posters outside the office,” Lam said, adding that a debt note demanding her friend pay HK$3 million was stuck on the notice board outside the office along with the friend’s wedding photograph.
She said it was the first such attack since her office was set up on the estate 20 years ago.
Her friend, surnamed Wong, told her he did not owe anyone money, she said. “It appears someone tried to frame him,” Lam said.
She said it was possible someone was trying to discredit her ahead of the upcoming district council elections.
Less than six hours later, police were called at about 6.15am after the front door and window of the office of Christopher Chung Shu-kun, a lawmaker with the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong and also an Eastern district councillor, was daubed with red paint.
According to police, an A4 sheet of paper with a note demanding someone settle a debt was found stuck on the wall outside the office in Yue Wan Estate in Chai Wan.
Chung’s assistant said they would not comment on the case as police were investigating.
The two offices are about 1.2km away.
Police are treating the two cases as “criminal damage”. Officers from Eastern police district are investigating.
Police figures show there were 4,006 reports of criminal damage across the city in the first eight months of this year, a 1.9 per cent rise from 3,930 in the same period last year.
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/law-crime/article/1877037/debt-demand-and-red-paint-poured-offices-hong-kong-district
