Chan Man-lok was the first defendant in the 1999 'Hello Kitty murder' case in Tsim Sha Tsui. The violence grew out of a debt of a few thousand Hong Kong dollars: Chan, then 33, together with Leung Shing-cho and Leung Wai-lun, held 23-year-old Fan Man-yee in a third-floor flat of a tenement at 31 Granville Road, beating and abusing her over an extended period until she died. The body was dismembered and the skull hidden inside a Hello Kitty doll, a detail so shocking that the case also became known as the Kowloon West torture case. After Fan disappeared and her family searched in vain, the case was uncovered only on 26 May 1999 and came to trial at the High Court the following year. During the trial the prosecution relied heavily on the evidence of a 13-year-old girl who had witnessed part of what happened and who testified as an accomplice witness. On 6 December 2000 the jury ruled six to one that the three men were not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter. Justice Peter Nguyen, describing the conduct as exceptionally cruel, imposed life sentences on all three, the harshest penalty ever handed down for manslaughter in Hong Kong. Chan, the first defendant, must serve at least 20 years before he can seek a review of his sentence; his co-defendant Leung Shing-cho won an appeal and was released in 2014. The case, numbered CACC 522/2000, filled the press for days, and the tenement where it happened was demolished in 2012 and rebuilt as a hotel in 2016.
The case pushed the maximum penalty for manslaughter to life imprisonment and became a sentencing reference for later grave violence; after days of press coverage the public paid closer attention to how missing persons and abuse cases are handled, and the case was adapted for film and television more than once.
Achievements
- 1999 · With Leung Shing-cho and Leung Wai-lun, held and abused Fan Man-yee in a Granville Road flat until she died
- 2000 · A High Court jury ruled six to one that the three were not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter and sentenced them to life imprisonment
- 2014 · Co-defendant Leung Shing-cho won his appeal and was released, while Chan must serve at least 20 years before seeking a sentence review