Former cinema manager and usher deny $130,000 ticket scam
2000-4-13
Two former employees of a cinema, who had allegedly pocketed proceeds totalling about $130,000 from the sale of 5,000 stolen tickets, were charged by the ICAC.
The suspected scam was uncovered last October during an ICAC investigation into a corruption complaint which alleged an usher of Astor Classics Cinema of bribing his supervisor for conniving at the sale of fake tickets. The cinema has recently closed dow n.
Kwan Chi-hang, 30, and Ho Yiu-chung, 22, former deputy manager and usher of the cinema respectively, appeared at South Kowloon Court this morning.
They pleaded not guilty to a joint charge of conspiracy to defraud the Classics Cinema Limited (CCL), which owned the cinema, by selling stolen tickets to customers and pocketing the proceeds between April 1 and October 6, 1999.
The duo were said to have falsely represented that the cinema computer system was out of service and manually entered details on blank admission tickets. After selling these tickets to customers, they allegedly did not report the proceeds to CCL.
Magistrate Mr H.A. Mierczak adjourned the case to July 26 this year for trial at San Po Kong Court . Kwan and Ho were respectively granted cash bail of $10,000 and $5,000 and were ordered not to interfere with prosecution witnesses.
ICAC officer Kenny Tse appeared for the prosecution today.
The suspected scam was uncovered last October during an ICAC investigation into a corruption complaint which alleged an usher of Astor Classics Cinema of bribing his supervisor for conniving at the sale of fake tickets. The cinema has recently closed dow n.
Kwan Chi-hang, 30, and Ho Yiu-chung, 22, former deputy manager and usher of the cinema respectively, appeared at South Kowloon Court this morning.
They pleaded not guilty to a joint charge of conspiracy to defraud the Classics Cinema Limited (CCL), which owned the cinema, by selling stolen tickets to customers and pocketing the proceeds between April 1 and October 6, 1999.
The duo were said to have falsely represented that the cinema computer system was out of service and manually entered details on blank admission tickets. After selling these tickets to customers, they allegedly did not report the proceeds to CCL.
Magistrate Mr H.A. Mierczak adjourned the case to July 26 this year for trial at San Po Kong Court . Kwan and Ho were respectively granted cash bail of $10,000 and $5,000 and were ordered not to interfere with prosecution witnesses.
ICAC officer Kenny Tse appeared for the prosecution today.