The Justice of Apathy

Below is the statement provided to police last month regarding a dual robbery at home by my former driver.

On Friday 4 September 2009 I returned home from a business trip to Shanghai. As usual, I unpacked my bags personally upon arriving home. I specifically take care to return all my valuable items such as watches, electronic equipment and cameras to their respective storage locations within my bedroom and study. On this date, I placed my Panerai watch (value HK$42,000) and my Casio camera (value HK$3,000) in my drawer. This was the last time I saw either item.

For the next 6 weeks, our domestic helper (Michelle Castillo), my partner (Levina Poon) and my daughter (Aria Parker) all consistently searched the house for the missing items, spending over 100 hours. This search and the fact the items were missing caused considerable stress for all concerned.

On Wednesday morning 14 October 2009 I was hurriedly preparing to leave for the airport on a business trip to Singapore. In my routine manner I went to my watch drawer to grab my Cartier watch (value: $50,000) to wear it on the trip. I picked up the Cartier, but given the stress of still having not found my Panerai watch, I prudently put it back, deciding I was not going to take any watch on the overnight trip to Singapore.

Upon my return in the afternoon of Thursday 15 October 2009, I went through my usual routine of unpacking my bag. This time I returned a pair of cufflinks to my watch drawer. To my astonishment, the Cartier watch I had left behind 30 hours earlier was gone. I immediately interrogated our domestic helper, who mentioned she noticed it was gone a few hours earlier whilst undertaking her typical cleaning procedures. It was at this point I first thought there may be some connection between the three missing articles.

Whilst questioning Michelle Castillo, I asked who had been in the vicinity of my bedroom whilst I had been away. She replied that the only people were herself, Levina Poon, a workman installing shelves in the study and our driver Cheng Chung Wai. I was shocked to learn that our driver had been inside the house (he is forbidden from entering the house) and furthermore was upstairs in the private area of the house. I asked how Cheng had gotten inside and then upstairs and she indicated he had forced his way past her insisting on supervising the activities of the workman inside. Michelle tried to stop him but was overpowered. Stupidly, Michelle failed to inform Ms Poon or myself at this point, but instead went back to her duties in the kitchen downstairs.

[Background: Cheng Chung Wai has worked for me as the family driver since 21 August 2008. As a Police Reserve member, we always considered him safe and trustworthy. However, I grew increasingly wary of his character during early to mid 2009 as my office began receiving many strange telephone calls from loan sharks and underworld-type people looking for Cheng, and informing that he owed them significant amounts of money. Coupled with the fact, Cheng had applied inappropriately to several of my professional colleagues to extend him a loan on multiple occasions, a concerning image was emerging. At this point Ms Poon asked Cheng what was going on and why people were chasing him for repayment of loans. Cheng said his sister was going bankrupt and these weren’t his debts but hers. In August, Cheng informed Ms Poon his sister needed money to pay lawyers processing her bankruptcy. He asked us for HK$26,000 representing 2 months advance salary to be paid back by him over a 6 month period. Ms Poon paid him the money. Despite being told repeatedly in early 2009 not to use my office address and phone number for his purposes, right up September we continued to receive calls for him at my office. I asked one caller why he was calling my office number looking for Cheng, he informed me that Cheng was applying for a loan from his company using Taubman’s (my employer) name, address and phone numbers as his employer’s details. Cheng was fraudulently representing he was an executive with Taubman. This was clearly very concerning to me. Instead of confronting Cheng over this revelation, I informed my colleagues to monitor Cheng and bring to my attention any further incoming calls for Cheng.]


After consultation with Ms Poon and further questioning of our domestic helper Michelle, I concluded there were three possible culprits responsible for stealing the Cartier watch: the workman, Michelle Castillo and Cheng Chung Wai. Ms Poon called both the workman and Cheng to ask if they knew anything about the missing watch, both said ‘no’. Michelle also denied any involvement in the robbery.

On Friday 16 October 2009 at 10:00am, I asked Ms Poon to telephone Cheng and tell him that if the three missing items were returned to our letterbox by 4:00pm that day, no further investigative or legal action would be taken. She also informed Cheng that he was one of three suspects in this matter and that the other two were being given the same opportunity to return the stolen items. Thus, whoever was responsible could remain anonymous and not jeopardize their future relationship with us. However, in reality Cheng was the ONLY suspect told to return the items to the letterbox. Absolutely no recovery discussions were conducted with the other two suspects.

At precisely 4:00pm I went to our letterbox and found my stolen Cartier watch wrapped in scrap paper inside. The missing camera and Panerai watch were not there. It was now categorically clear that Cheng’s forced entry inside the house at around 4:00pm on Wednesday 14 October 2009 had been the occasion for him to steal the watch.

The recovery of the Cartier watch was encouraging; however there were still two missing articles that had been stolen from the same drawer as the Cartier at some point in the preceding 40 days. My primary objective was to recover the stolen items and insure no further robbery could occur. I immediately notified all related parties including Michelle Castillo, the security guards at my house and all my Taubman employees of Cheng’s actions to ensure they remained on alert.

At 4:30pm I asked Ms Poon to call Cheng and inform him that we had received the Cartier but still wanted the Panerai watch and Casio camera returned, and to also inform Cheng his employment had been terminated for obvious reasons. Privately I had concerns about the recovery of these two items from Cheng as they had been stolen some time earlier, and were thus likely to have already been re-sold or placed with a pawn broker in exchange for cash. Recovery of these items after several weeks would be difficult. Nonetheless, Ms Poon pushed Cheng to return the two items.

Cheng admitted to stealing the two items and a deadline of 5:00pm Monday 19 October was agreed to by Cheng to return the Panerai and camera. The deadline passed without return of the items. Ms Poon then called Cheng and he informed her he couldn’t return the watch or camera. Cheng offered no explanation as to why he couldn’t. Ms Poon told him if he couldn’t return the stolen items then he needed to repay the amount in cash (HK$44,000) by 5:00pm Friday 23 October 2009), Cheng asked Ms Poon to prove the replacement cost of the items. (Ms Poon had already been to the respective shops to obtain the current pricing of the items). Cheng agreed to repay $44,000 in cash. No separate request was made at this time to repay the HK$26,000 Cheng borrowed from Ms Poon in August 2009.

On Friday evening 23 October 2009, Ms Poon made several attempts to call Cheng but his phone was off.

On Monday 26 October 2009, Cheng called Ms Poon (using a new mobile number) to inform us he couldn’t pay back the money as it was simply too much for him to manage. Ms Poon consulted with me, then called Cheng back offering a payment plan for HK$44,000 over 8 months; the first payment of HK$5,000 being due on Monday 2 November 2009. As at today’s date, no money has been received.

We recognize we should have reported the multiple robberies and home invasion of 14 October 2009 earlier to Police. However, we desperately wanted to recover our stolen property and provide Cheng with the opportunity to redeem himself.

We now wish to prosecute Cheng for his committed and confessed actions to the fullest extent of the law.


The above statement was provided as part of a 3 hour consultation with the dectective squad of Hong Kong police who seemed interested in pursing the matter. So interested in fact they arrested Cheng within 48 hours of me visiting the police headquarters. However he was released on bail whilst the police conducted further investigation.

Today, I've been informed that because the police have been unable to find the stolen Panerai and have found nothing in Cheng's apartment that is suspicious, they are NOT willing to prosecute him. This is a pretty filmsy excuse when we have two events of robbery, a confession from the robber himself and a heap of supporting circumstantial evidence. What does it say when someone steals from you, you report it to the police and the confessed thief is able to talk his way out of even being prosecuted, let alone convicted.

Justice seems to be applied in the most selective manner in today's society. Perhaps the police decided Cheng wasn't worth it, or better yet, I wasn't.