Guilty plea in organ donation register case

HKU student falsified applications to request donor withdrawals from system in city

A university student has pleaded guilty to faking withdrawal applications in Hong Kong’s organ donation system amid a wave of irregular requests following a government announcement of a cross-border matching scheme.

Wong Tsz-shing, 20, a student at the University of Hong Kong, yesterday pleaded guilty to one count of criminal damage by interfering with the organ donation system through inputting personal details of the donors on their behalf without consent, including those of lawmaker Junius Ho Kwan-yiu and former chief executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor.

Eastern Court Magistrate Stephanie Tsui May-har heard Wong had found the personal information from a doxxing website, after he read the news about the city government’s proposal for the cross-border donation mechanism with the mainland.

The collaboration mechanism between Hong Kong and the mainland is expected to be set up to match patients in need of transplants with potential donors under the scheme proposed by the city’s health authorities in May last year.

It sparked controversy over unverified claims about Beijing harvesting political prisoners’ organs and the transparency of the mainland’s healthcare system.

Wong, majoring in economics and public administration, told the court he had “developed his own opinion” on the scheme and was trying to express it by interfering with the organ donation system.

In mitigation, Wong expressed remorse and said the conviction had dashed his hopes of becoming a teacher and cost him a once-in-a-lifetime chance to study in the United Kingdom.

“It was a very childish act … He was plainly stupid when he thought of expressing himself through the most wrongful way,” his lawyer told the court.

Wong sought to be examined if he would be fit for community service, but that request was rejected by Magistrate Tsui.

Tsui ordered Wong to be remanded in custody while the court waited for a background report for consideration in sentencing. She said a custodial sentence was likely to be imposed.

A summary of facts presented at court showed the Hospital Authority recorded an unprecedented number of withdrawal requests between May 22 and 25 last year, with more than 28,000 applications received via the system or by post.

More than 75 per cent of the applications were found to be invalid, as some applicants never registered for organ donation.

The design of the online system provides no means for individuals to instantly check their status on the central registry’s website.

Police launched the investigation in June and found Wong’s IP address through firewall records.

Wong was arrested on June 5 last year. He will be sentenced on March 27.