SECRET AND PERSONAL
HKK 382/2
The Hon L M Davies CMG OBE JP Secretary for Security Government Secretariat HONG KONG
23 March 1978
нка 412/393/4
HKA
RECEIVED SAY NO. 51 3 1 MAR 1978
DESK OPRZER
INDEX
KEC STRY PA thorian Taxes
21
1. You will by now have had our two telegrams giving authority for the application of CR55 in respect of 135 police officers in the Yau Ma Tei case and telling you of our reservations in twelve other cases. I am sending with this letter copies of the three submissions that I made to the Secretary of State on this case. This so that you will know the considerations raised here in London as a contingency against queries being raised in Hong Kong.
After reading
2. I was struck by three facets of this affair. through 147 ICAC case files, the strongest impression I gained was of the slip-shod and inept quality of the investiga- tion carried out. Time after time there was an element missing from the quantum of evidence given which could easily have been provided, e.g. it is claimed that a police officer belonged to a certain unit at a certain time, a matter easily checked from police records but no attempt has been made to provide corroboration. It was alleged that an officer took part in a raid, he denies it, again no attempt to check from the official records. A witness alleges that the accused is well-known to another of the witnesses but no attempt is made to check this. Similar glaring inadequacies occur time and time again.
This affair was known to ICAC
3. Secondly, the time scale. in October 1976. I vividly remember Jack Cater telling me about the affair then. It is now some 18 months later and it
The Civil Service is only now that action is being taken. Branch would claim with justice that it was only in January that a political decision was taken here to allow the use of CR55. That is perfectly true; but two months lapsed between January and the time when I was asked to approve these cases within three working days.
4. Thirdly, if the state of affairs in Yau Ma Tei police district is representative of other districts, then the Hong Kong Police is in an even more desperate situation than I had imagined. It appears that in the Yau Ma Tei Fruit Market one of the stalls, instead of selling carrots or sprouts, was selling heroin. Every police officer in Yau Ma Tei appeared
SECRET AND PERSONAL
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