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The judgment states that the three defendants responded to the online “Lunch With You” rally on 12 November 2019, gathering in the vicinity of Pedder Street, Des Voeux Road Central and Connaught Road Central in Central. On that day, protesters blocked roads and disrupted traffic, damaged traffic lights and tunnel entrances, spray-painted and erected roadblocks with bricks and miscellaneous items, and formed an umbrella barricade to confront the police. The police repeatedly warned with flags and fired tear gas to disperse them. The defendants were captured on video chanting slogans on the road, picking up and transporting bricks, providing cover for the destruction of buses and roadblocks, and were arrested after attempting to flee and hiding in an emergency exit at Landmark. The prosecution called six police officers to testify and presented over a hundred segments of public and closed-circuit television footage, totalling thirty exhibits, to evidence the defendants’ participation in the riot and masking. The defendants argued they were merely bystanders or had passed through accidentally, and offered defences of “passing by out of curiosity” and medical reasons, which the court rejected.
According to the statutory requirements of section 19 of chapter 245 of the Public Order Ordinance (riot offence) and section 3 of chapter 241K of the Emergency Regulations Ordinance (prohibition on masking), and with reference to the Court of Final Appeal’s principles on participation, fluidity and the cumulative effect of environmental evidence in riot offences.
All three defendants were at the core of the riot, had heard and seen events and actively participated in blocking roads, collecting and transporting bricks, and forming an umbrella barricade to shield acts of destruction. They were still masked when arrested to evade investigation. Their defences were self-contradictory and inconsistent with the video evidence, and failed to undermine the only reasonable inference: that the defendants had a strong intent to participate and provided substantial support.
The judge considered that the three defendants were not innocent passers-by but deliberate participants who remained on site to bolster their numbers and support others in the riot. Their testimonies contained multiple contradictions and were inconsistent with the video evidence, so their reasonable doubt arguments were not accepted.
The court finds the three defendants guilty of the riot offence (Count 1). The fifth and ninth defendants are also convicted of using masking items in an unlawful assembly (Counts 6 and 10). The third defendant also admitted to contravening the anti-masking regulations (Count 4), and is convicted. (Translated from Chinese to English by AI)
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