perhaps more important, someone in the Force might well have adverted to the fact that he might be in possession of his Civil Aviation Department "red" permit which gave him access to all restricted areas in Kai Tak Airport. It never crossed the minds of the Commissioner or the officers of the Anti-Corruption Office that GODBER might have such a permit. Their minds were concentrated on the collection of evidence. Mr. Paul GRACE was not told anything about the details of the Anti-Corruption Investigation-although he suspected that something of this nature was afoot. Nevertheless, he said frankly and honestly:
"looking at the matter in retrospect, I suppose I was remiss in not thinking about this."
Mr. Ko Chun, the Superintendent in charge of Kowloon City Division, who was primarily responsible for making recommendations in regard to the issue and withdrawal of such permits to police personnel, said that he would not have considered questioning the propriety of GODBER Continuing to possess a Civil Aviation Depart- ment permit merely because he had been transferred to Police Headquarters.
The Commissioner, in evidence, said that he has now issued orders that in future no police officer will be permitted to have a Civil Aviation Pass except when actually on duty, that is to say such passes will be kept at the Airport Police Station when not actually in use by officers in the course of their duty.
GODBER was not kept under surveillance. Mr. DAWSON said that this was considered by him and rejected. His evidence on this reads:-
"I arrived at the conclusion that it would be useless to place GODBER on surveillance for the following
reasons:
(a) we could rely on the stop list;
(b) our surveillance capability is mainly Chinese and this is difficult with an expatriate target; (c) GODBER would be surveillance conscious having been an instructor in this field;
(d) the legality of such an action. It seemed highly likely that GODBER would have ‘blown' sur- veillance and he could then complain that he was being harassed. We were anxious to do nothing that might prejudice the case.
I explained to the Commissioner of Police why I felt surveillance was wrong and that the law such as it is left us with little to do except await the expiry of the seven-day period he had been given by the Attorney General.”
It is easy to criticise those reasons, looking at the matter in retrospect. One naturally asks oneself now: what good was the stop list in the case of a police officer of GODBER's seniority, armed, as he was, with a "red" Civil Aviation permit and his police warrant card? I do not understand reason (d). Surveillance simply means that the police are observing the movements of the suspect. He could not legitimately complain to a court of law that he was being "harassed", provided that nothing was done which could be said to amount to an obstruction of his freedom of movement.
As regards the effectiveness of surveillance, that is an entirely different matter on which, perhaps, I am not competent to express a view. I accept Mr. DAWSON's evidence that GODBER had been an expert instructor in this field and knew all the "tricks of the trade". I also accept his evidence that it may be difficult for Chinese sur- veillance officers to keep an eye on an expatriate target 24 hours a day in that the expatriate may frequent buildings into which it would be impossible for a Chinese police officer to go without making himself obvious. I also accept the fact that a full surveillance for a week would involve a very considerable number of officers. Mr. DAWSON said that it might involve as many as 50 officers, having regard to the fact that the "observers" have to be changed frequently a very considerable amount of man power, especially at the height of the Fight Violent Crime Campaign.
On the other hand, GODBER was a very important target. He was far more than a suspect. The police attitude was that the 7 days allowed to GODBER was simply a waste of time; and I agree with them. In these circumstances, it seems to me that some surveillance would have been better than no surveillance at all. It might not have been effective. On the other hand, I cannot bring myself to believe that it could not possibly have served any useful purpose; and I can well imagine the reaction of any officer connected with the case upon receiving a report from a surveillance officer at, say 11 a.m. on 8th June that GODBER had been seen entering the office of a travel agency at 10 a.m. that day!
Not only should some attempt have been made to keep GODBER under surveillance. I think that Mrs. GoDBER should also have been kept under some surveillance. True, she had committed no offence. But neither had GODBER. By the evening of 4th June, it was clear that the $4.3 million was held in accounts in various banks overseas in the joint names of GODBER and his wife. It did not necessarily follow from this that she was privy to his activities. But there was ground for suspecting that she was. Surely what mattered was that, owing to this peculiar provision in our law, a man who was in possession of tremendous financial resources (jointly with his wife) and who, in all
15