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carried out to the very end, the adverse consequences would be far reaching and no less serious than overthrowing the Government of the HKSAR.
Individual Sentence
D1 Tai Yiu-ting
38. D1 is now aged 60, a former associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong. He has two criminal records (2019 and 2022).
39. As to D1’s role in the Scheme, we, in essence, stated that in paragraphs 109 125, 132 133, 137 141, 144,159 161, 172 173, 175, 186 190 of our Reasons for Verdict. For more details, one might wish to look at the Summary of Facts admitted by D1.
40. Mitigation letters from D1, family members, former university colleagues and pastor had been submitted to this Court. They praised D1 for his contribution to the teaching of public law at the University of Hong Kong and a firm supporter of the rule of law.
41. We were mindful of the fact that we were sentencing all the defendants on a conspiracy offence. It was the unlawful agreement that we sentenced them on. In determining the criminality of the conspiracy offence, we took note of the elaborate planning of the Scheme as described in paragraphs 26 to 30 stated above and the seriousness of the offence as stated in paragraph 36 above. In short, D1 was not only the initiator of the Scheme, but also an organiser of the Primary Election. It was his article that caught the attention of the pro-democracy camp. He
