Court Quashes Donald Tsang's Conviction

The Court of Final Appeal has quashed the conviction of former Chief Executive Donald Tsang, who has already completed a 12-month jail sentence for misconduct in public office.

Tsang was found guilty of failing to tell the Executive Council about a property deal he had with a businessman, whose company was applying for a digital radio licence between 2010 and 2012.

In quashing the conviction, a panel of five judges agreed that the trial judge had not given jurors adequate directions before they found the former CE guilty in 2017.

The top court judges said because the jury had not been able to agree during the original trial that there was an element of corruption involved, it was important for the judge to properly instruct the jurors to consider the motive of Tsang for not disclosing the deal to Exco.

The top court stressed it was important for jurors to decide whether the former CE had deliberately concealed the information, or if he simply didn’t see the need to do so.

The judges also ordered that there should be no retrial for Tsang, as it would not be in the interest of justice to do so.

Tsang, who was chief executive between 2005 and 2012, was originally jailed for 20 months. The term was later reduced to 12 months by the Court of Appeal which upheld his conviction.