Jail for student after messing up organ-donation system for fun

A University of Hong Kong student has been jailed for eight weeks for impersonating a TVB actor and withdrawing his organ donation registration.

Wong Tsz-shing, 20, earlier pleaded guilty at an Eastern Magistrates' Court to a count of criminal damage after he withdrew Raymond Cho Wing-lim's donation registration from the Centralized Organ Donation Register system, to which he also tried to enter the personal information of former Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and lawmaker Junius Ho Kwan-yiu in May last year.

The defense said Wong, who was granted a HK$20,000 cash bail, will appeal his sentence. He is banned from leaving Hong Kong and has to surrender his travel documents as well as reporting to police twice a week.

Magistrate Stephanie Tsui May-har yesterday slammed Wong for seriously damaging the system, which is of public interest.

"[The system] is not allowed to be damaged just because of a person's personal view or for fun," she said.

"The actual victims would be people in need of help, who are suffering from serious diseases and waiting for an organ donation."

Tsui said Wong committed a serious offense, adding imprisonment is an appropriate punishment.

The court had heard that Wong filled out other people's personal information, including name, ID number, and e-mail account, to cancel their organ donation registration.

According to his web page records, he entered Lam and Ho's personal information but did not file withdrawal applications. However, he applied to cancel the registration for Cho.

When he was arrested on June 5 last year, he told police he obtained Cho's personal information on a doxxing website and committed the offense "for fun and out of curiosity."

In mitigation, the defense said Wong is an undergraduate at HKU majoring in social sciences and has always been a good student.

Wong missed the university exams and exchange activities as he was remanded, and was informed by the university this month he will face a disciplinary hearing, the defense said.

Wong chose to enter the personal information of people he learned from classes, such as Lam, but had no intention to target them or express his dissatisfaction against the government, the defense said.

It said he was remorseful and understood what his actions caused, appealing to the court to hand down a lenient sentence as he is not yet 21 years old.

wallis.wang@singtaonewscorp.com