Integrity Focus

A tenant of a residential flat, charged by the ICAC, was today (March 10) convicted at the Shatin Magistrates’ Courts of offering a bribe of $1,000 to an estate agent and requesting the latter to conceal from an estate agency that he had defaulted a tenancy agreement to avoid giving up his deposit as compensation.

Du Du, 48, was found guilty after trial of one count of offering an advantage to an agent, contrary to section 9(2)(a) of Prevention of Bribery Ordinance (POBO).

Magistrate Mr Jeffrey Sze Cho-yiu noted that in the present case, a custodial sentence was inevitable. The magistrate adjourned the case to March 25 for sentence, and granted him bail pending the defendant’s background report.

The court heard that on the morning of November 6, 2022, the defendant viewed a residential flat in Tai Wai for rent upon the arrangement by an estate agent of Midland Realty International Limited (Midland Realty). The defendant rented the flat at $16,000 per month by signing a provisional tenancy agreement with the flat owner on the spot.

The defendant subsequently viewed another flat in the same estate through another channel. On the same afternoon, he contacted the estate agent expressing his wish to cancel the provisional tenancy agreement.

According to the terms of the agreement, the party cancelling the agreement had to pay a compensation equivalent to the deposit, i.e., $16,000. The defendant then offered a bribe of $1,000 to the estate agent and requested the latter to assist in concealing from Midland Realty that he had signed the provisional tenancy agreement with the flat owner but defaulted the agreement.

The estate agent did not accept the bribe and reported the matter to Midland Realty, which rendered full assistance to the ICAC during its investigation into the case.

The prosecution was today represented by Senior Public Prosecutor Timothy Chen, assisted by ICAC officer Emily Cheung.

According to Section 9 of the POBO, it is a bribery offence for a person who, without lawful authority or reasonable excuse, offers an advantage (including money, gifts, loans, commissions, positions, contracts, services, favours, etc.) to an agent (including employees of private organisations) to influence the agent in exercising one’s duties. Members of the public should report suspected corruption to the ICAC without delay.