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| Lorain's employer who frequently took her to Shenzhen could no longer be located |
Family members of a Filipina helper who fell to her death
three and a half years ago in Shenzhen are shifting their money claim to the
Employee Compensation Fund Board after their lawyers failed to get hold of the
maid’s employer.
Gu Huai Yu, the Chinese male employer of Lorain Asuncion, was
a no-show in District Court in the first scheduled hearing of the claim filed
against him by the Asuncion
It was from the 22nd floor flat of Gu’s father-in-law Liu
Heping in Longgang District, Shenzhen, that Asuncion
Both Shenzhen and Hong Kong police, as well as a private
medico legal in Shenzhen, have ruled out foul play after conducting separate
autopsies on Asuncion
Solicitor Evelyn Tsao of Patricia Ho and Associates, who
represented the Asuncion
Tsao told Judge Katina Levy they would seek compensation
from the Fund Board after exhausting all means to locate, and serve court
summonses, to Gu.
The judge set the next hearing for June 5 at the request of
Tsao, who said she would prepare the round for shifting the claim to the EC
Fund Board.
When asked outside the court how much would the compensation
claim be, Tsao said it would be around $30,000.
“But that still depends on the Fund Board, which we expect
to defend itself against the claim,” she explained.
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Gu and Liu were arrested on Aug 17, 2017 after they were
summoned to the Hong Kong police headquarters
in Wanchai, and held on a charge of conspiring to defraud Hong Kong Immigration
by claiming that their maid would work only in the territory.
Police reportedly found out that the Filipina had been taken
across the border by her employers four times in the nine months that she worked
for them.
However, the police dropped their case against the couple on May 7, 2018, citing lack of evidence.
However, the police dropped their case against the couple on May 7, 2018, citing lack of evidence.
Ten months later, Asuncion ’s family
suffered another setback when they were informed by the Hong Kong Labour
Department in March 2019 that it had not investigated the case supposedly because
she died outside Hong Kong .
Eman Villanueva, chairperson of Filipino Migrant Workers Union,
blasted Labour’s failure to investigate, saying it “sends the message that once
a foreign domestic worker is sent out of Hong Kong
to work elsewhere, the employer is no longer accountable to her.”
