Retired Police Officer Jailed Over Home Loan Fraud

A retired police superintendent was on Monday sentenced by the District Court to a year and a half in prison for deceiving the government and a bank into granting him housing and mortgage loans worth about HK$6 million.

Lung Siu-chuen, 55, was earlier convicted of two counts of fraud after pleading not guilty to the charges that were said to have taken place in 2016.

The court heard that as the owner of a Discovery Bay flat, Lung failed to declare to the Treasury Department that he had signed a tenancy agreement for the unit when applying for a housing loan worth HK$2.1 million under a government loan scheme.

According to the rules, properties acquired under the scheme could only be occupied by the loan applicants or their families, with letting or subletting prohibited.

The court also heard that he had told HSBC that the flat would be used by his parents and failed to mention the tenancy agreement, and the bank later granted him a mortgage loan of HK$3.9 million.

Lung has since retired.

Passing sentence, judge Sham Siu-man said the case was serious as the defendant had used fraudulent means to deceive the government and the bank.

The judge said Lung rented out the flat “out of greed”.

Sham added that given the defendant was a law enforcer, he should not have committed the crimes. He also ordered Lung to return HK$1.1 million in rental income he'd pocketed within 21 days.