Intl performers featured on Lee Tung Avenue’s New Year parade

 

A golden dragon hangs alongside Lee Tung Avenue's signature lanterns

For the first time in seven years, Lee Tung Avenue in Wan Chai will again hold its “Chinese New Year Parade” on Feb. 12, or the third year of the Year of the Dragon, from 5:30pm to 7pm.

Two international performing groups which will take part in the Cathay International Chinese New Year Parade in Tsim Sha Tsui on the evening of Feb. 10, the first day of the Lunar New Year, will be showcased in Lee Tung Avenue’s post-parade show.

PINDUTIN PARA SA DETALYE

The first team, Golden Dream, is a 10-member dance troupe from Spain that has won numerous awards in the Carnival Torrevieja in Spain and Festival di Sanremo in Italy. The performers will turn the temperature up with their colourful and lavish outfits and passionate dancing.

The other team, Universe of Lights from Germany, is made up of eight stilt-walkers who will surely amaze everyone with their enchanting movements and out-of this-world costumes.

These stilt performers from Germany are another must-see on Lee Tung Avenue

They will be given support by dancers from the Jean M. Wong School of Ballet and SDM Jazz & Ballet Academie, who will present a playful Lunar New Year-themed performance with Chinese elements.

The “God of Fortune” will also be present to distribute candies and offer his blessings as well as photo opportunities.

The show is open to the public but those who want to enjoy it away from the crowds can watch at leisure from the alfresco dining areas or balconies of any of the restaurants along Lee Tung Avenue, which is bounded on one end by Queen’s Road East and the other on Johnston Road.

The Golden Dream performers in their lavish costumes are a show-stopper

Also as part of its Lunar New Year celebrations, Lee Tung Avenue will host a lion dance show, and a lion dance experience workshop with a professional instructor, on the first two days of the new year, Feb. 10 and 11.

The lion dance performances will be held in four sessions on both days: from 1 to 1:15pm, 2:15 to 2:30pm, 5 to 5:15pm, and 6:15 to 6:30pm.

TAWAG NA!

The workshops will be conducted 10 minutes after each performance, and will last for about 30 minutes. Those who wish to join the workshops must register beforehand and comply with a minimum spending requirement at the venue.

Those who missed the performances on these two days can look forward an even bigger show, the Dragon & Lion Dance Spectacular, a Lee Tung traditional offer, which will be held on Feb 20, from 2 to 2:30pm.

PINDUTIN DITO

The breath-taking performances will include high pole jumping as well as a boisterous and colourful procession featuring a giant golden dragon.

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!

Education changes lives behind bars

 

Alan (with his hand raised), excels in prison school which he is allowed to attend fulltime

Hong Kong’s Correctional Services Department is helping prisoners transform their lives through its Ethics College, a school behind bars.

Among those who have benefited from the program is Alan (not his real name) who recently attained 96 marks out of 100 in his Mathematics exam at the school.

“I never thought I could make it,” said Alan, who is serving time for drug trafficking, and who used to fail all his exams while studying.

PINDUTIN PARA SA DETALYE

Alan is among inmates given the chance to pursue a one-year, full-time Diploma of Applied Education, instead of working while in prison.

The aim is to better equip them for their eventual release, help them encourage positive values and eventually, change their lives for the better.

After he was detained, Alan initially tried to self-study but found it impossible given the prison routine, lack of mentors, and the fact that he left school more than a decade ago.

TAWAG NA!

“I tried to learn English by myself while in custody before but it was too hard to do so because no one could help me when I did not understand something,” he said. “I gave up eventually.”

After he became a student at Ethics College student, Alan made a remarkable improvement in both his intellectual capacity and attitude, which he attributes to his caring teachers and hard-working fellow students.

CSD Assistant Officer I Or Siu-ming, who is responsible for overseeing students’ discipline and performance in the school, said he was impressed by the big change in Alan.

PINDUTIN DITO

“I felt really touched by Alan’s positive changes here, from being a person with low confidence to a better one who would plan for his future.”

In the last four years of his prison term, Alan plans to pursue an associate degree so he could boost his chances of pursuing a well-paying career and repay his parents for their sacrifices.

“When I was young, my parents had very high expectations of me and wanted me to concentrate on my studies, but I got them disappointed,” said Alan.

“This time, I will never let them down again. I hope to better equip myself here and find a good job after I get released.”

Bella is all praises for everyone who helps with their studies, like officer Hui

Another student at Ethics College is Bella (also not her real name) who is also serving time for drug trafficking.

Bella did not finish Form 5 and feared that her failure to complete secondary school would hinder her chances of finding a good job after her release.

But she was glad to have been proven wrong when she was accepted into the Ethics College.

“When I learnt that I could study again, I was very happy and took the chance to apply. I could not imagine that I would be finally admitted to the college.”

Bella said she receives enormous support for her studies, not just from her regular teachers.

“Apart from classes on school days, there are also volunteers visiting and tutoring us during the holidays. After class, I can use a tablet to continue my revision in my dormitory,”  she said, adding that the officers who look after the students are kind and caring.

The department’s Assistant Officer II Hui Ka-yin, who supervises Bella in the college, praised her for being hard-working and for helping to create a good learning atmosphere in class, inspiring her fellow classmates to work hard as well.

“After studying one semester, she grew in confidence and became a hard-working person who is eager to plan for her future,” said Hui.

Bella, who expects to be released this year, now has a clear career goal.

“I have already found my interest here,” she said. “I plan to further my study in animal-assisted therapy. I want to do a job that I like in the future.” 

Ethics College was launched at the end of October with a total of 75 students in its first batch.

They comprise 60 male students who are receiving their education at Pak Sha Wan Correctional Institution, while 15 females attend classes remotely at Lo Wu Correctional Institution.

Another beneficiary of prison education is Mario delos Reyes, shown here with the late
Consul General Bernardita Catalla, who witnessed him being awarded a master's degree in 2019

(P.S. Before Ethics College was set up, those in detention were already given an opportunity to take up various courses. Among them was Mario delos Reyes, who spent 26 years in Stanley Prison for a murder conspiracy he had always insisted he was not part of.  During his long incarceration, delos Reyes took up all courses that were on offer, including a  Master’s in Business English awarded to him a few months before his release in October 2019. He rejoined his family in Nueva Vizcaya, and passed on less than two years afterwards).

 

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!

25 persons arrested in weekly anti-illegal work operations

 

20 people were arrested in just one of the targeted locations

A total of 24 suspected illegal workers and one employer were arrested in the latest weekly anti-illegal work raids carried out by the Immigration Department and the HK Police across the city.

The four-day operations were carried out from Jan 29 to Feb 1 (Tuesday to Thursday last week) in 88 targeted locations, including premises under renovation, a recycling yard, restaurants, retail shops.

The biggest operations covering 77 locations were carried out in Central, where five of the suspected illegal workers were arrested. They comprised four men and one woman, aged 28 to 55.

Pindutin para sa detalye

In the other raids which covered 21 target locations in unspecified districts, 19 suspected illegal workers, comprising 14 men and five women aged 25 to 65, were arrested. 

One of them held a recognizance form certifying her claim against being sent back home and prohibits her from taking any employment.

One man aged 42, was arrested on suspicion of employing the illegal workers.

TAWAG NA!

Immigration warned the public that anyone found to have violated a visa condition by working illegally  shall be prosecuted and if found guilty, could be jailed for up to two years and fined a maximum of $50,000.

Those who, on top of this violation, is found to be an overstayer or subject to a  removal order can be jailed for up to three years and fined $50,000.

Employers of illegal workers face a maximum prison term of 10 years and a fine of $500,000. 

PINDUTIN DITO

Immigration requires all employers not just to check the HKIDs of job applicants, but to make other enquiries that would show that the persons they are hiring are legally employable.

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!

Arrested DH concerned over where to stay in case she is granted bail

A Filipina domestic helper arrested for money laundering before she could board her flight to Manila last Jan. 26, was sent back to jail after she did not apply for bail when she appeared yesterday (Feb. 2) at the Eastern Court.

Ma. Rochel Fuentes, 35 years old, instead requested to be given access to her mobile phone so she could contact a shelter for OFWs, and arrange for her accommodation in case she is allowed later to post bail.

Principal Magistrate Ivy Chui not only granted the request, conveyed by a duty lawyer assigned to Fuentes, she also scheduled a bail review for Feb. 9.

Pindutin para sa detalye

Fuentes is charged with “dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of indictable offense,” which is punishable under the Organized and Serious Crimes Ordinance with up to 14 years in jail, and a maximum fine of $5 million.

The charge arose from police investigation into a total of $666,300 being moved in and out of her Standard Chartered Bank account within two days last year, on April 2-4.

Fuentes was to take the 11:45am AirAsia flight to Manila when she was stopped at immigration and turned over to the police.

TAWAG NA!

A friend had said Fuentes intended to go home to wait for her new work contract to be processed, after her previous employer of five years relocated to another country.

A police spokesman said that after investigation, Fuentes was taken to Eastern Court on Jan 27 and charged with money laundering.

Her family and friends who heard about her arrest sent appeals on social media, saying she was being detained at Central police station because someone had used her name to take out a loan without her knowledge.

PINDUTIN DITO

Staff at the Migrant Workers Office of the Philippine Consulate who spoke with Fuentes’ relatives said they had called the police and were told that she had been taken to Eastern Court on Jan. 27 to be charged.

FDHs are among vulnerable groups that have been linked to money laundering cases in the past few years, often through the use of their bank accounts by scam syndicates.

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!

Emry’s owner jailed 32 months for laundering $5.7m earned from jobs scam

 

Ylagan running for cover after an earlier hearing of her case at the District Court  (File)

The co-owner of what used to be the biggest employment agency deploying Filipino workers to Hong Kong was today sentenced to 32 months’ imprisonment for laundering more than $5.7 million she made from defrauding about 500 jobseekers.

Ester P. Ylagan, 71, was stoic as she was sentenced by Deputy District Judge Katherine Lo, two weeks after she pleaded guilty to four charges of money laundering. 

The charges stemmed from the cash remittances she made to various people in Malaysia, Nigeria, Burkina Faso and Turkey between January to July 2016, knowing that the money she sent were proceeds from a crime. 

In court to witness the end of the seven-year case were three of more than 100 Filipino victims who filed complaints against Ylagan after being charged between $10,000 and $15,000 each for non-existent jobs in the United Kingdom and Canada. 

Joining them was Ester Bangcawayan of the Mission for Migrant Workers who helped pursue their case with the police and the courts.

Her victims (first 3 from the left) were in court along with staff of the MFMW

Dozens of victims had agreed to act as witnesses against Ylagan, if she persisted in pleading not guilty to the charges. Those who were in court said they were glad that Ylagan was finally going to jail, but were upset that she was not ordered to compensate them.

The judge said Ylagan promised the mainly domestic helper applicants jobs in Canada and the UK, with salaries of as high as £2,000 for any job. Keen to leave their Hong Kong jobs, they paid Ylagan more than $6 million in total between January and June 2016.

The judge said part of this sum was remitted by Ylagan overseas. The rest, which she said amounted to about $570,000, was not accounted for. “So the defendant received more than she remitted,” said the judge.

Pindutin para sa detalye

This belied the defense claim that Ylagan was herself a victim, asserting that about $2 million of what she sent overseas was her own money.

More than 100 complainants against Ylagan gathered outside Central police station in 2016

In the first charge, Ylagan was accused of remitting a total of HK$2,633,181.52 and US$44,658 (HK$347,439) to Malaysia, Nigeria and Burkina Faso between Jan 29 and May 5, 2016. The total sum of HK$2,980,620 was dealt with in cash.

In the second count, she was accused of moving a total sum of US$300,000 (HK$2,334,000) from an account with Standard Chartered Bank to a recipient in Turkey from May 12 to 23, 2016.

The third charge said Ylagan, using her account at HSBC, again sent to Turkey a total of US$10,055 (HK$78,227) between May 25 and 26, 2016.

TAWAG NA!

In the fourth charge, she remitted again to Turkey a total of US$50,000 (HK$389,000) from her HSBC account on Jul 8, 2016.

Judge Lo said that Hong Kong laws provide a maximum jail term of 14 years and a fine of up to $5 million for the crime of money laundering.

In Ylagan’s case, she used as starting point a sentence of four years in jail, but after allowing a one-third discount - 23% for the guilty plea and 10% for the supposed reimbursement of 45 victims - and applying the totality principle, arrived at a sentence of 32 months for all charges.

PINDUTIN DITO

Before sentencing, the judge noted that Ylagan had continued sending money to “William,” a recruitment agent she met only online, even after being warned by the Philippine Consulate that she was being scammed.

Even her own staff at Emry’s had refused to send any more money on her behalf after several remittance companies stopped taking their orders as early as April 2016, but she persisted.

Ylagan, here at The SUN office in May 2016, was advised to return the OFWs' money immediately  

Rejecting the mitigation that Ylagan had been put under severe stress by the long period of time it took for the case to be resolved, the judge said the delay was “not entirely unreasonable.” She noted that the police had to interview about 100 of more than 500 victims, and had to check with several remittance companies and consult the consulates of the Philippines, the UK and Canada to build up their case.

Ylagan’s jail time will only partly vindicate the duped jobseekers, who had clung to the hope that they could still recover their money, despite the defendant filing for bankruptcy earlier. Her lawyer also told the court that she had subsisted on her earnings as an assistant cook, and later, on financial assistance from the government.

Through her counsel, Ylagan claimed she had intended to refund her victims by selling her flat in Aberdeen, but that her erstwhile friend and legal adviser, barrister Ody Lai, who offered to sell it for her, managed to acquire ownership over the property without paying her anything. Ylagan said she was still seeking Legal Aid to recover the flat.

Ylagan fled Hong Kong in July 2016 after the victims filed complaints with the Philippine Consulate and the police, and Emry’s was forced to shut down.

Before leaving Hong Kong, she jumped the gun on the complainants by going to the police to file a complaint about being duped of $4.19 million by a business partner she met only online, named William Clinton.

She and her husband, Ricardo Ylagan (who passed on in October 2017), also managed to transfer ownership over their Aberdeen flat to their son, Ridge Michael, on July 23, 2016, allegedly on Lau’s advice. 

But on March 20, 2017, the flat was recorded as having been sold to Lai for $5 million. (Related story here: http://www.sunwebhk.com/search?q=Ody+Lai&m=1 

In December 2017, Ester returned to Hong Kong and filed a complaint with the police against Lai, who was investigated but was allowed to post bail.

On June 7, 2018 Ylagan was formally arrested by the police for money laundering. She was also allowed to post bail.

All throughout, her victims were given help by then Labor Attache Jalilo dela Torre, the Consulate’s assistance to nationals section, the Mission for Migrant Workers, and The SUN.

In mitigation, defense counsel Michael Delaney said Ylagan, a college dropout, came to Hong Kong to work as a domestic helper in 1984. She was married with three children in the Philippines at the time.

Ylagan later divorced her first husband and married Rick Ylagan, who founded Emry’s in 1992. She bore him a son, Michael.

She had a clear record for the past 40 years in Hong Kong prior to the job scam saga. Letters submitted to court by various people, including employers and church people, described her as a woman of good character, while her lawyer said she was remorseful and at her age, is not likely to reoffend.

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!

DH lends ATM card, gets convicted for money laundering

 

The accused was arrested as she tried to exit HK on the way to Macau

A Filipino domestic helper found herself pleading guilty to a charge of money laundering today because an ATM card borrowed by an acquaintance ended up being used to deposit and withdraw a syndicate’s income from crime.

Julie Constantino, 35 years old, was not immediately sentenced at the Kowloon City Court, as Acting Principal Magistrate Ko Wai-hung ordered a background report on her.

Pindutin para sa detalye

But Magistrate Ko warned her that “a committal sentence is inevitable.”

He adjourned the case to Feb. 27 for the sentence and sent her back to jail, where she has been held in custody since her arrest last December at the immigration control checkpoint for people travelling to  Macau.

According to a police complaint read to her, a total of $352,500 was deposited and withdrawn using the ATM card for her Hang Seng Bank account.

TAWAG NA!

The ATM card was earlier borrowed by an acquaintance --the helper of her employer’s friend – who told Constantino that her boyfriend needed a bank account to receive $15,200 to be remitted to him.

After she lent the ATM Card and disclosed its PIN, deposits and withdrawals were made in the account from Aug. 30 to Sept. 16, 2021.

PINDUTIN DITO

Constantino claimed she did not know how the account was used after she lent the ATM card, until she was arrested as she was exiting Hong Kong to board a bus to Macau in December last year.

The acquaintance who borrowed her ATM card has left Hong Kong, leaving her to answer the criminal charge.

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!

Filipina bound over for throwing down cleaning lady’s mobile phone

 

Maritime Square (photo by Ck Yu on Google Maps)

An unemployed Filipina with no fixed address is now back on the streets after a charge of criminal damage against her, for grabbing and throwing down a local woman’s mobile phone, was withdrawn by prosecutors today at West Kowloon Court.

Instead, M.C. Magno, 44 years old, agreed to be bound over with the warning that she will be made to pay $1,000 to cleaning lady Tsoi Mei Chun, if she commits another offense within the next 12 months.

TAWAG NA!

Magistrrate Jason Wan also ordered her to pay $500 as court costs -- exactly the amount she posted as police bail after she was arrested near the Maritime Square mall in Tsing Yi, New Territories.

The case arose on Sep. 7 last year under a footbridge near Maritime Square, when the cleaning lady accosted Magno and told her to turn over a bag full of used aluminum cans she had collected from friends and the neighborhood in Tsing Yi.

PINDUTIN DITO

The cans can be sold for cash in a nearby junk shop.

When Magno refused, the cleaning lady took out her mobile phone and started taking a video of her.

Angered by the gesture, she grabbed the phone and threw it down.

The cleaning lady called police and Magno was charged with criminal damage, an offense under Section 60 (1) of the Crimes Ordinance.

PADALA NA!

Call us!

CALL US!