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Liaison Bureau Detective Senior Inspector Go |
LIAISON Bureau Detective Senior Inspector Go
Tze-kuan was invited to participate in a mock
trial held in Beijing last January.
The trial was part of a seminar jointly organised by the Department of Justice, The Advocacy Institute of Hong Kong and the Law Faculty of Beijing University. SIP Go played the role of a police officer and was commended by Secretary for Justice Elsie Leung for his performance. It was the first time the SAR Government has jointly organised a seminar and mock trial with mainland legal institutions. The seminar's main aims were to compare the difference between the legal systems in Hong Kong and the mainland and to give academics and legal professionals a better understanding of the two legal systems. Most of the seminar's participants are local legal and judiciary professionals. |
To make the trial more authentic, the Secretary of Justice had earlier written to the Commissioner of Police, inviting the participation of one Hong Kong Police officer. SIP Go was selected to take up this role because of his liaison experience in handling cross boundary matters and his ability to speak Putonghua, in which the mock trial was conducted. |
Mock trial participants from Beijing and Hong Kong
pose for a photograph in the Chinese capital
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Said Go Tze-kuan: "I played the part of a police officer who was the first to arrive at the scene
to arrest the suspect and later defendant. The evidence I gave during the trial centred around the
defendant's confession that he had killed his wife."
SIP Go was impressed with the professional manner in which the mock trial was conducted, and the depth of research involved. "The Department of Justice selected a real murder case and condensed it into a three-hour trial which involved a lot of editing work and revisions to the script to suit the purpose of the seminar. In fact, rehearsals for the mock trial began as early as December last year, taking place in the judge's chamber. The Department of Justice also appointed a narrator to help the audience understand the procedures of the trial, said SIP Go. "Apart from running a bit too smoothly (most defendants and witnesses are not as precise and accurate in court), the trial, which progressed without a hitch, almost felt and looked like the real thing, said Mr Go. " Perhaps this was because the players were all legal professionals and the irrelevant parts had been eliminated." During the mock trial, several participants encountered difficulty pronouncing some phrases in Putonghua. But with assistance from the Official Languages Agency representative, they managed to play their parts accurately. On the second day of the highly praised and successful seminar, the Hong Kong delegation was invited to witness a real trial at a Beijing law court. SIP Go admitted that his performance in the mock trial was very different from his other assignments in the Liaison Bureau but equally important in matters of co-ordination between the Force and its mainland counterparts. | |
