Six Public Security Police (PSP) officers were sentenced to between 21 months and 15 years in prison on Friday for a range of crimes such as offering banned travellers illegal entries, stays and exits in Macau for cash.
According to The Macau Post Daily, the ruling was handed down by the Court of First Instance (TJB).
The male sextet were arrested in January last year on suspicion of assisting a loan-sharking gang by leaking confidential police in- formation, arranging illegal entries and exits for travellers banned from the city and abetting their illegal stays in Macau.
The sextet consisted of PSP officers Lam Kok Sam, U Chi Wai and Chio U Kuan, aged between 34 and 48, PSP deputy chiefs Chong Chan Wai and Lai Weng Hang, aged 35 and 50 respectively, and 52-year-old retired PSP chief Mak Kin Hon.
Over a period of four years, according to the charge sheet, the sextet committed the various crimes at least 48 times, involving at least 1.83 million patacas in ill gotten gains. All defendants had been on remand since their arrests.
Chong was convicted of 26 crimes including bribery and malfeasance, and was given a jail term of 15 years, the highest among the sextet. Lam was convicted of 16 crimes such as abetting, fraud and leaking confidential information, and was put behind bars for 11 years.
According to Chao Im Peng, the presiding judge of the three-member bench, four of the defendants, namely Chong, Lai, U and Chio, arranged illegal entries and exits for banned travellers. Lai, U and Chio were sentenced to nine, four and seven years in jail respectively.
Mak, the sixth defendant, was convicted of bribery and sentenced to one year and nine months imprisonment. The court ruled that Mak would not be held in custody, but was ordered to post bail of 50,000 patacas within five days of the sentencing, report regularly to the authorities, and banned from leaving the city.
The remaining five defendants were taken back to prison in Coloane after the sentencing.
