Former Hong Kong 3D printing technician pleads guilty to inciting copycat attacks on police after July 1 stabbing
- Lai Chit, 36, pleads guilty to incitement to wound with intent over provocative posts he made on popular LIHKG online forum
- He has been remanded in custody until his sentencing on August 24
Lai Chit, 36, pleaded guilty to incitement to wound with intent at the District Court on Wednesday over provocative posts he made on the popular LIHKG forum, a Reddit-like online platform.
He admitted to calling for attacks on police officers a day after the fatal incident outside Sogo department store in Causeway Bay on July 1, 2021, when former Vitasoy purchasing agent Leung Kin-fai drove a dagger into constable So King-cho’s back, before stabbing himself in the chest.
A jury determined the 50-year-old attacker’s death to be a suicide during an inquest last year.
Posting two comments in a thread titled “A technical discussion: how should we use a knife?”, Lai wrote about a blade needing to be sharp with appropriate curves to “stick through chest or back muscles, as well as cloth”, recommending a chef’s knife for its ability to “easily cut into a big piece of fillet”.
The 36-year-old also detailed how to pierce flesh for maximum impact, and commented on Leung’s death.
“I don’t really want brothers-in-arms to kill themselves after assassinating [someone] like Uncle Leung. However, if someone reaches the depths of despair, others can’t completely counsel you. Hope everyone takes good care,” Lai wrote.
In his second post, made within two minutes of the first, Lai replied to another comment in the same thread with an image showing an individual sticking a blade into another person’s neck, and a screengrab of someone using knives.
Prosecutor Kathy Sum told the court the defendant had said to police officers while under caution that he made the posts to share a butcher’s “cooking skills” and teach others how to use knives. Lai explained his mention of “Uncle Leung” served to discourage others from attacking police officers.
The defendant, a former assistant technical officer who handled 3D printing, also said that the images he posted were of a “foreigner” sticking a knife into a human dummy.
In mitigation, defence counsel Simon So Shun-yan urged the court to consider Lai’s remorse over the pain he had inflicted on his own family, his mental state at the time of the offence and the small number of online posts made.
Referencing a privately obtained psychiatric report, So appealed to the court to consider that Lai had acted out of stress, saying the defendant was certified as not having violent tendencies.
So also said Lai had cherished time spent with his chronically ill mother, who required his care, as relations had been tense since his arrest.
The defence counsel then urged the court to view Lai’s posts as one singular comment given the short gap between the two posts, adding he had a low chance of reoffending.
“The defendant was a nobody – he was not participating in political action. He was just an ordinary citizen without the power to incite others like a celebrity. There were no ripple effects from his post,” So said.
Barrister So appealed to Deputy District Judge Edward Wong Ching-yu to consider Lai’s case as less serious than that of 22-year-old student Yip Sin-man, who had been jailed for ten months over the same offence after the attack on the police officer.
Prosecutor Sum agreed the case was less serious, as Yip had mentioned the use of guns and breached the Department of Justice’s injunction order against doxxing by posting personal information of a police officer online.
So had also appealed to Judge Wong to consider a reduced sentence, as two years had passed from the day of Lai’s offence.
The prosecution rejected the proposal, arguing the defence counsel had requested four delays throughout the trial, amounting to seven months.
Lai will be held in custody until his sentencing trial on August 24.
