A Singapore man was sentenced to 11 years in prison by a Hong Kong court on Tuesday, March 11, for two distinct offenses of robbery and attempted robbery.
The Hong Kong daily Ming Pao reported that the 75-year-old Leong How Seng entered a guilty plea on March 10 to one count of robbery and one count of attempted robbery.
In April 2022, Leong, who was then 73 years old, robbed a China Construction Bank (Asia) branch in Kowloon's Nathan Road with an air gun, and fled the scene with around HK$14,000 (S$2,400) in cash. Reportedly, he entered the bank and passed a note to a bank employee that said: "We have a gun, put the money into the bag quickly, if you don't co-operate, we will shoot."
When the employee attempted to delay for time, Leong threatened to murder her while pointing the air gun at her.
Leong said that he used around HK$7,500 to pay rent to his landlord, HK$1,000 for a new bag and HK$100 to top up his Octopus transport card. However, he was arrested at home on the same day by the police, who used CCTV camera footage to track him down. They retrieved an air gun, HK$5,750 in cash and the clothes he wore at the bank.
According to investigations, he also overstayed in Hong Kong with a girlfriend, who was a former English teacher whose income was severely reduced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Leong's wife had also stopped communicating with him.
Born in Singapore, he informed the court, he has been residing in Hong Kong since 2007.
According to his defense attorney, Leong has never applied for public assistance or worked in Hong Kong. His girlfriend and his money were his only sources of income.
He committed the offenses because he was in debt and having financial difficulties. Leong is in bad condition, according to his lawyer, with heart issues and trouble walking.
Judge Douglas Yau Tak-hong ruled that robbery and intimidation with a gun-like instrument were grounds for a minimum 12-year sentence, according to Yahoo Hong Kong.
On July 1, 2022, Leong had made another attempt at robbery at a pharmacy in Golden Plaza in Mong Kok. "Robbery! Surrender the money if you want to live, hurry, or burn you to death with petrol," he wrote in Chinese on a slip of paper that he showed the cashier. But the cashier was unmoved and asked him to leave.
Leong had attempted to scare a pharmacy chain clerk into handing him money by imitating a combustible substance with water.
When Leong was sentenced, the judge recognized that the threat posed by a petrol bomb was different from that posed by water.
