Kam C. Wong: One country two systems: cross-border crime between Hong Kong and China
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Kam C. Wong: One country two systems: cross-border crime between Hong Kong and China Transaction Publishers: New Brunswick (U.S.A.) and London (U.K.), 2012, ISBN: 978-1-4128-4623-3, 260 pages, $39.95, £30,95, $C47.95 Chuen Tien Nadine Chen Published online: 9 October 2012
# The Author(s) 2012. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com
The curtains closed on Hong Kong’s legendary gang boss “Big Spender” in 1998 when the Guangzhou Higher People’s Court confirmed his guilt in masterminding the most notorious kidnappings Hong Kong had ever seen. Coming after a series of incidents that roused public concern over the erosion of the rule of law following the return of Hong Kong to China in 1997, the case was the first case to test Hong Kong’s legal autonomy since the Handover. Kam C. Wong had a front row seat to the negotiations between the British and Chinese governments over the transfer when he was a public law lecturer at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Later, as the Director of Chinese Law Program of the University, Wong became involved in the “Big Spender” case as it was the first time a Hong Kong legal resident was prosecuted, tried, and executed in China under the PRC Criminal Law for criminal conduct perpetrated largely in Hong Kong. With the eye of an insider, mind of a professional (both as a legal intellectual and consultant of the Hong Kong Police), and heart of a Hong Kong permanent resident, in One Country Two Systems: Cross-Border Crime between Hong Kong and China, Wong addresses legal and policy questions that arise when two Chinese jurisdictions clash, namely, how to resolve the conflict between Article 6 of the PRC Criminal Law (which allows the prosecution of criminal conduct committed outside of China in the PRC courts) and Article 19 of the Basic Law (which gives Hong Kong courts jurisdiction over all cases in the Region), and whether Hong Kong should have asked for extradition of “Big Spender” notwithstanding the absence of victims’ reports and the PRC’s concurrent jurisdiction claim. With modern advances in communication, transportation and business structure, “national borders are becoming increasingly obsolete and irrelevant to criminal activities.”1 The growth of commercial activities and ease of travel between
1 KAM C. WONG, ONE COUNTRY TWO SYSTEMS: CROSS-BORDER CRIME BETWEEN HONG KONG AND CHINA 171 (2012) (citing Brian Tkhuck and Yvon Dandurand, “Recent International Efforts to Address Transnational Crime,” Paper Presented at the International Converence on Crime and Criminal Justice in a Borderless Era, Ritsumeican University, Kyoto, Japan, November 2, 1998, 2).
C. T. N. Chen (*) Duke University, Durham, NC, USA e-mail: [email protected]
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Mainland China and Hong Kong in particular contributed to the explosion of crossborder crimes.2 The HKSAR and the PRC have shared criminal intelligence and mutually assisted in criminal investigations through INTERPOL since 1987, but no formal judicial assistance agreement has ever been reached. Overall, PRC-
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