HKSAR v. HUANG JIANXIONG

DCCC 1078/2025

[2026] HKDC 1277

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

CRIMINAL CASE NO 1078 OF 2025

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REASONS FOR SENTENCE

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1.  The Defendant (“D”)  pleaded guilty to one count of dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of an indictable offence (“money laundering”), contrary to section 25(1)  and (3)  of the Organized and Serious Crimes Ordinance, Cap 455 (“OSCO”).

Facts

2.  D is a Two-way Permit (“TWP”)  holder.

3.  A victim of a telephone deception (“V”)  was lured by scammers into remitting funds totalling HK$18.61 million between 11 December 2018 and 23 January 2019 to various designated bank accounts, one of which was D’s account with the Bank of China (“the Account”). The Account received a total of HK$3,063,800 from V between 12 and 18 December, 2018.

4.  The Account was opened on 15 November 2018. On the account opening mandate, D claimed to be the owner of an engineering company in mainland China. He submitted his China ID card and his TWP in the account opening process and applied for online banking service. He was provided with an ATM card and monthly statements by the bank.

5.  Fund flow analysis of the Account shows that between 15 November and 18 December of 2018, this account had 11 deposits (including remittances from V)  totalling $3,064,010 and 14 withdrawals totalling $3,063,939. All the funds were siphoned off to other accounts within a day or two of their deposit. The Account was used as a temporary repository of funds. Hallmarks of money laundering were detected.

6.  The large sums of money deposited into the Account were incommensurate with his financial background and were not supported by any official receipts. No tax return was ever filed by D during the material time.

7.  D was arrested on 17 April 2025 at Lo Wu Control Point when he tried to enter Hong Kong. In a video-recorded interview, he admitted under caution that the personal data and signature on the opening mandate of the Account were all his and he had submitted his TWP and China ID card to the bank. He claimed that he had been told by a man to open a bank account in Hong Kong to borrow money and had been given $5,000 by this man for the opening of the Account but this fund was subsequently withdrawn by the man. He was not able to provide the name or means of contact of this man to the police.

8.  D was the sole signatory of the Account and was apparently always in control of it. He was thus found to have dealt with the funds in the Account during the material time, knowing or having reasonable grounds to believe that the said property, in whole or in part, directly or indirectly represented any person’s proceeds of an indictable offence.

Defendant’s Background

9.  D is 53 years old. He resides in mainland China, where he was born and educated. He separated with his wife in July 2025. He has 3 children who are aged 22, 20 and 15 respectively. He worked as a construction worker on a casual basis and earned around RMB3,800 a month.

10.  He has a clear record.

Mitigation

11.  Defence counsel Mr. Terry Kan submitted that the main mitigating factor is D’s plea of guilty. He is remorseful and he promises not to re-offend.

12.  D did not know the source of the “black money” and there were no international elements. He played a minor role, and was obviously a money laundering stooge who had received no remuneration.

13.  Counsel referred to HKSAR v Boma [2012] 2 HKLRD 33 [40] and HKSAR v Hsu Yu Yi [2010] 5 HKLRD 545 [9] for some of the significant considerations in sentencing for this type of offence. He pointed out that while there are no sentencing tariffs for money laundering cases, the Court of Appeal in Secretary for Justice v Wan Kwok Keung (雲國強)  [2012] 1 HKLRD 201 [15] observed that the starting points for previous money laundering cases set out by Cheung JA in Hsu Yu Yi (許有益) indicated that the starting point is 3 years or so where the proceeds involved is between HK$1 million and HK$2 million, 4 years or so where the proceeds involved is between HK$3 million and HK$6 million, and could be over 5 years where the proceeds involved is above HK$10 million.

14.  Mr Kan pointed out that the total amount of proceeds involved in our case is $3,064,010, suggested a starting point of 2 years 9 months’ imprisonment, and referred to a District Court case[1] in which such a starting point was adopted for laundering HK$2.95 million in 7½ months.

15.  Counsel did not oppose the application for the enhancement of sentence under OSCO, but asked the court to temper justice with mercy by applying a 20% enhancement.

Sentencing considerations

16.  Money laundering is a serious offence which attracts a maximum sentence of 14 years’ imprisonment.

17.  It is a serious offence as it is an attempt to legitimise proceeds from criminal activities. Successful deterrents against money laundering could be effective measures against crime. No guidelines for sentence of such an offence have been laid down as the crime can be committed in a variety of ways and there is a wide range of culpability.

18.  According to Hsu Yu Yi, the factors to be considered in sentencing for this offence are: (a)  the amount of money involved is a major consideration; (b)  the offender’s level of participation; (c)  the sentence imposed on the predicate offence if it can be known; (d)  if the case has an international element; and (e)  the length of time the offence lasted.

19.  The Court of Appeal in Boma emphasized the importance of deterrence for this kind of offence, pointed out that the amount of money laundered was a significant feature, and set out a non-exhaustive list of other significant features, which includes: (i)  the nature of the predicate offence; (ii)  the state of the offender’s knowledge; (iii)  whether an international element was involved; (iv)  the sophistication of the offence; (v)  whether organised criminal syndicate was involved; (vi)  the number of transactions and length of the offence; (vii)  whether the offender continued to launder funds after knowing that they were proceeds of a serious crime; and (viii)  the offender’s role and the acts performed by him.

20.  There are also the observations made by the Court of Appeal in Wan Kwok Keung regarding the brackets of sentence for different ranges of money laundered, as referred to by Mr. Kan in his submission. The Court in HKSAR v Liao Liting (廖麗婷)  CACC 334/2015 remarked that while these observations are not sentencing guidelines, they provide valuable reference[2].

21.  The Court in Secretary for Justice v Tse Chi Kin （謝志建）CAAR 4/2024 pointed out that in dealing with money laundering sentencing, the judge should consider on the one hand the maximum sentence for this type of offence and the need for deterrent sentence, and on the other hand the facts of the case and his overall impression of the case; the judge should not merely rely on the appropriate sentencing bracket for the amount of money laundered.[3]

22.  This case involves laundering HK$3,064,010 in 34 days.

23.  The facts indicate that D came to Hong Kong to open a bank account which was then used as a means to launder proceeds of crime. In defence counsel’s words, D was “obviously a stooge or money mule”. I am skeptical though, about the claim that D received no remuneration. However, as pointed out in Hsu Yu Yi, it is the amount of money laundered rather than the offender’s reward or benefit that is the major consideration.

24.  Nevertheless, his role can be said to fall towards the lower end of the “gradations of culpability” mentioned in Boma[4].

25.  Given the circumstances of this case, and bearing in mind that this is a very serious offence which calls for deterrent sentence even for a first-time offender like D, I consider 36 months’ imprisonment to be an appropriate starting point.

26.  His guilty plea will reduce the sentence to 24 months’ imprisonment.

27.  A statement dated 24 June 2026 made by Chief Inspector LI Yiu-nam (“the statement”)  of the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Risk Assessment of the Financial and intelligence Bureau was tendered by the prosecution in support of its application under section 27(2)  of OSCO to enhance the sentence on the grounds of prevalence and the nature and extent of harm caused to the community.

28.  The statement describes someone who has assisted in the money laundering activities but has minimal or no involvement in the predicate offence or has little or no knowledge about the predicate offence as a money laundering stooge.[5]

29.  Paragraph 19 of the statement says: “As can be seen from Table A, the use of stooge remains prominent. There is a rising trend in the use of stooge from 31.38% recorded in the year 2020 to 75.10% recorded in the year 2024. The police have spent a lot of resources on crime prevention, advertising and warning people not to ‘sell’ or ‘lend’ their bank accounts to others and could possibly be lured into taking the risks of commission of ML offence. It seems that the trend remains prevalent albeit all the publicity work.” 

30.  I note that the percentage of the use of money laundering stooges for Jan-May 2026 is 73.29%, and the total amount of reported losses and/or proceeds laundered in money laundering cases for the same period in 2026 is $1,232.59 million.

31.  The statement points out that the increasing use of money laundering stooges has hampered the anti-money laundering regime in Hong Kong in that it interfered with the normal operation of the banking system and harmed Hong Kong’s reputation as an international financial centre, encouraged more crimes to be committed, allowed culprits to make use of their ill-gotten gains to engage in a wider range of illegal activities, increased the investigation efforts and resources of law enforcement agencies, and rendered people with low income or little realisation of the consequences of selling their bank accounts more likely to be lured into surrendering their accounts for monetary rewards.

32.  I accept entirely all the matters set out in the statement, and find the sentence enhancement application proved beyond reasonable doubt.

33.  Although both the number of cases and the total amount of losses have been on the decline, these offences are still prevalent and causing tremendous harm to the community. I will enhance the sentence of 24 months’ imprisonment after plea by 25%, thereby raising it to 30 months’ imprisonment as the final sentence on the charge.