Stiff sentence for ex-NGO head in tutors' pay scam

Wallis Wang

A former director of a non-governmental education organization was yesterday sentenced to four-and-a-half years in jail by the district court for defrauding the Education Bureau of over HK$10 million.

Ho Hin-wah, 55, was the former director of School Support Association.

He was convicted of two counts of conspiracy to defraud and one count of conspiracy to use false instruments.

Ho's codefendant, Mandy Man Hoi-yan, 34, who was the manager of the NGO, was sentenced to 22 months in prison.

She had pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to defraud and testified against her former boss.

In sentencing, judge Isaac Tam Sze-lok said the crime was serious as it spanned two years and involved four to five people.

He added that Ho was the mastermind who personally benefited from the fraud, warranting a harsher sentence.

The court heard that Ho and Man's organization, as well as Childcare Association (of which Ho's wife Cho Ying was a director), received approval from the Education Bureau to provide after-school activities at the primary and secondary school level,

Between the 2015/16 and 2016/17 school years, the bureau granted over HK$6.5 million and HK$3.8 million to Ho and his wife's organizations, respectively.

However, the defendants conspired with staff to defraud the bureau by falsely claiming the tutors were paid higher hourly rates than the actual salaries of HK$60 to HK$140 per hour.

Before inspections by the bureau, Ho, Cho and Man arranged for tutors to sign fake contracts and provided false documents to the officers.

Cho has since left Hong Kong and is wanted by the ICAC.

In mitigation, the defense said Ho was educated in Australia and joined the education sector in 2007 at his wife's invitation, but they became estranged in 2016.

Ho had, it is claimed, to care for their children while working as a driver and that Man merely followed orders without personal gain.

The defense also argued there had been a delay in prosecution, but the judge took issue with this claim, noting the prosecution had to handle 100 witnesses and over 40,000 pages of documents amid social unrest and the Covid-19 pandemic.