Hong Kong Activist Gets 9 Years in Prison

The first person convicted under Hong Kong’s national security law has been sentenced to nine years in prison after being found guilty of terrorism and secession in a watershed ruling that could act as a benchmark for the city’s revamped judicial setting.

Leon Tong Ying-kit, a former waiter at a restaurant, was sentenced on Friday following his conviction Tuesday after a 15-day trial. The 24-year-old was found guilty of driving his motorcycle into police officers during a street protest in July of 2020 while carrying a flag saying, “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of the times.” Ina break with past practice, the case was heard by three specially enlisted judges with no jury. Eric Yan-ho Lai, a Hong Kong Fellow at Georgetown University, pointed out that according to the text of the national security law, acts of secession deemed to be serious would face a jail sentence of not less than five years. A terrorism act that was deemed serious would warrant a sentence that exceeds 10 years. The law analyst said Tong’s sentencing indicates that the three-judge panel views secessionist acts, such as bearing a flag in a public scene, as a serious crime in Hong Kong.