In 2019, Hong Kong witnessed the outbreak of the Anti-Extradition Bill Movement, lasting over six months and encompassing protests across all districts of the city. It was the largest anti-authoritarian movement in Hong Kong’s history. The decentralised strategies and methods employed in this movement inspired civil resistance against authoritarianism globally, spreading the protest model to various regions. However, the outcome of the movement in Hong Kong is regrettable: the authorities failed to comprehensively address the protesters’ democratic demands. Instead, they used legal and judicial means to pursue ordinary participants in the movement, attempting to resolve political disputes through legal channels. To date, over 10,000 people have been arrested in connection with the Anti-Extradition Bill Movement, with nearly 3,000 prosecuted. Many cases are still under trial, and the Hong Kong authorities continue to arrest individuals associated with the movement.
Over the past five years, Hong Kong courts have issued nearly 3,000 criminal verdicts related to the movement. These judgments document the authorities’ depiction of the protests, the courts’ reasoning behind convictions or acquittals, and the application and interpretation of relevant criminal laws for prosecution and sentencing. Regardless of one’s agreement with the court rulings, the historical and research value of these texts is undeniable. This database has made every effort to collect court decisions related to the Anti-Extradition Bill Movement for educational and research purposes. These records are still accessible on the website of Hong Kong’s judiciary, but their continued availability to the public in the future remains uncertain. All judicial records collected and displayed here are secured and maintained using blockchain technology, through which they are decentralized and immutable, ensuring transparency, tamper-resistance, and trust in the integrity of the data. Our goal is to utilize blockchain as a form of censorship resistance to preserve invaluable public records.
We hope this database will encourage more scholars, legal practitioners, and media organisations to analyse and investigate the trials and verdicts arising from the Anti-Extradition Bill Movement.
If there are any omissions in this database, please feel free to notify us. We also welcome your feedback—thank you!