Murder of Luk Chi-wai

Luk Chi-wai (陸志偉; 1981 – May 14^th, 1997) was a member of Hong Kong youngster gang. The 16-year-old victim was beaten to death by 14 teenagers for several hours after being seen as a traitor to the gang. The 14 defendants, who were all under 18 at the time, lured Luk to their hideout, locked him up and tortured him. After the gang found out Luk was dead, they dragged him to the garbage room nearby and burnt his corpse.

Background

Luk lived at the Sau Mau Ping Estate and was friends with a group of teenage gang members and usually hung around with them. The gang would constantly bully a 30-year-old mentally ill cleaner, Chan Muk-ching, who worked at that residential estate and used his home as their gang hideout. After one incident where Chan was beaten to the point of being seriously injured, Luk persuaded him to report to the police. After the gang heard about the news, they considered Luk a traitor and decided to "punish" him.

Murder

On the night of May 14^th, 1997, the gang lured Luk to Chan's estate. After Luk arrived the gang locked him up and began to torture him. Luk was beaten and kicked by the defendants in turn, beaten with weapons such as iron pipes and folding chairs, and forced to eat cigarette butts. Luk also had his head slammed against the wall, floor and stools. After Luk lost consciousness, the gang drenched him in freezing water to wake up him and continue the torture.

After the gang found out Luk was dead, the gang attempted to rescue him but was unsuccessful. The 17-year-old gang leader Fu Hin-chun (傅顯進) threatened the gang and Chan, who was also in the flat unit and witnessed the murder, to not alert the police. In the early mornings of the same day, the gang transported Luk's body in a cardboard box to the block 32 of the residential estate, a vacant building under demolition. The gang poured sulphuric acid onto Luk's on the body to make it more difficult to identify, and set his corpse on fire. They returned to the scene a few hours later and found that the body wasn't completely burnt so the body was set on fire again. The ashes of Luk were packed in garbage plastic bags and dumped at the garbage station. The ashes were never retrieved as the police believed that Luk's ashes had been transported to landfill.

Arrest

A week after Luk's death, Chan went to the hospital to seek medical treatment. The police stationed in the hospital found that his injuries were suspicious and started an investigation. Shortly later, all 14 culprits were arrested by the police.

Trial

Trial was held from early 1998 to January 1999. 6 of the 14 defendants were found guilty of murder. Among the 6, Hui Chi-wai, Ng Ming-chun, Chan Tak-ming and Fu Hin-chun were sentenced to life imprisonment. Mak Ka-ho left the scene early at the time of crime was did not participate in beating up the victim after he lost consciousness; and Wong Kam-bo was only 14 years old at the time of the crime. The two were given a discretionary waiver of life imprisonment and commuted their sentences to 26 years and 23 years respectively.

7 of the other defendants were found guilty of serious assault, assault, and mutilation of corpse respectively. The judge stated that the maximum sentence of assault is three years in prison, but considering that they had been imprisoned for 21 months from arrest to trial, they were sentenced to immediate release after the trial. Defendants Yuen Ka-yee and Wong Si-sing were sentenced to juvenile detention respectively for mutilation of corpse and manslaughter.

Defendant Shek Tsz-kin turned into a tainted witness, and pleaded guilty to the charges of manslaughter and mutilation of corpse. Shek was sentenced to 6.5 years in prison. When the judge delivered his verdict, he praised Shek for his full cooperation with the police and testified against the other defendants in court.

In 2001, the six defendants charged with murder submitted an appeal and had their verdicts overturned. Mak Ka-ho and Wong Kam-bo successfully appealed and their sentencing was reduced. The other four defendants' appeal were rejected.

Defendant	Name	Age	Profession	Criminal Record	Charge	Verdict	Appeal
1	Hui Chi-wai (許智偉)	17	Cleaner	Assault	Murder, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to life imprisonment	Unchanged
2	Hui Chi-yung (許智勇)	14	Student	-	Serious Assault	Sentenced to 21 months in prison	-
3	Mak Ka-ho (麥家豪)	17	Student	Robbery	Murder, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to 26 years in prison	Dropped murder charges, sentenced to 7 years in prison for serious assault
4	Ng Ming-chun (吳明俊)	16	Freelance	Theft	Murder, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to life imprisonment	Unchanged
5	Yuen Ka-yee (阮潔儀)	14	Student	-	Assault, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to 16 months in juvenile detention	-
6	Chan Tak-ming (陳德明)	16	Student	Assault, Mutilation of corpse	Murder	Sentenced to life imprisonment	Unchanged
7	Lau Pui-yee (劉佩儀)	14	Student	-	Assault	Sentenced to 21 months in prison	-
8	Wong Kam-bo (黃金寶)	14	Student	-	Murder, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to 23 years in prison	Sentence reduced to 19 years in prison
9	Chau Chun (周俊)	14	Student	-	Serious Assault	Sentenced to 21 months in prison	-
10	Fu Hin-chun (傅顯進)	17	Student	Robbery	Murder, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to life imprisonment	Unchanged
11	Chan Hun-kau (陳肯構)	15	Student	-	Assault	Sentenced to 21 months in prison	-
12	Law Kwai-fun (羅桂芬)	14	Student	-	Assault	Sentenced to 21 months in prison	-
13	Wong Si-sing (黃詩城)	14	Student	-	Manslaughter	Sentenced to 16 months in juvenile detention	-
Tainted Witness	Shek Tsz-kin (石子健)	16	Student	-	Manslaughter, Mutilation of corpse	Sentenced to 6.5 years in prison	-

Trivia

• The case is also dubbed as The Sau Mau Ping Gangs Corpse Burning Case (秀茂坪童黨燒屍案) in Asia.
• The 1999 Hong Kong movie Street Kids Violence (三五成群) was based on this incident.
  • Despite the movie being extremely low budget, many scenes and quotes are still being quoted till this day.