Dramatic Hongkong rogue cop killer inquest opens

By Staff
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HONG KONG, Feb 26 (Reuters) A joint inquest into the deaths of four people, including three police officers, today opened in Hong Kong's coroner's court in one of the more dramatic multiple murder cases in the territory in recent years.

The details could have come straight out of a popular Hong Kong gangster movie: a late night gun battle in a quiet pedestrian underpass last March involving three police officers that left two dead and one critically injured.

Unclear motives, including rumoured criminal links and an alleged gambling syndicate, have surfaced.

In opening the inquest today, Coroner Michael Chan said the hearing would seek to determine the causes and circumstances surrounding the deaths, rather than decide criminal liability.

Some 110 witnesses will be called in the inquisitorial style 37-day hearing, which will be one of Hong Kong's longest.

The police version of events is that off-duty constable Tsui Po-ko, 35, dubbed the ''devil-cop'' by tabloid Chinese newspapers, ambushed the two police officers; Tsang Kwok-hang and survivor Sin Ka-keung to steal their weapons.

Tsui and Tsang died in the shootout, while Sin, who was critically injured, pulled through and has been under police protection since.

Media reports at the time, however, quoted police sources as saying the shootout may have been sparked by a row over an illegal football gambling syndicate with alleged triad links.

Hong Kong's then police commissioner Dick Lee denied this theory within weeks of the shootout last March, but was criticised for drawing such a hasty conclusion.

''The behaviour of the police has been overwhelmingly aggressive so far,'' said James To, who chairs the security panel in Hong Kong's legislature. ''It gives me an uneasy feeling about some hidden facts that haven't emerged,'' To added.

The inquest will also determine whether Tsui carried out two other unsolved killings in 2001 -- one, another police officer who was ambushed and had his gun stolen, and the other a Pakistani security guard shot dead during a bank heist.

Hong Kong has a long cinematic tradition of films about triads, or organised crime syndicates, that pit good cops against bad, and the hit ''Infernal Affairs'' was adapted into a Hollywood blockbuster entitled ''The Departed'' that won four Oscars today including for best film and director.

In reality though, violent crime has diminished in Hong Kong in recent decades as the influence of the once powerful triad societies has waned. The city is widely considered to be one of the world's safest.

In 2006, there were 35 murders and about 5,300 robberies, 21 of which involved firearms or pistol-like objects.

REUTERS SHB SSC1119

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