RTHK senior editor handed 160 hours of community service for upskirt video

A senior news editor at Hong Kong’s government-funded broadcaster has been sentenced to 160 hours of community service after pleading guilty to filming up a women’s skirt in Mong Kok last year.

Chong Tak-yin, an Assistant Chief Assignment Editor at Radio Television Hong Kong’s Chinese-language news and current affairs division, appeared before Magistrate Jeffrey Sze at the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts on Wednesday morning.

He had earlier been charged with one count of unlawful recording or observation of intimate parts.

Chong’s lawyer told the court that the 57-year-old’s probation and community service reports were “positive,” adding that he has a family and a “good career,” according to court news outlet The Witness.

The defence said that Chong has sought professional help to address his issues, and that he is confident he can fulfil a community service order with a low risk of reoffending.

Chong’s full cooperation during the investigation reflected genuine remorse, his lawyer added, before Sze handed down a 160-hour community service order.

The maximum sentence for upskirting is five years’ imprisonment.

Chong is still listed as an editor at RTHK on the government’s civil servants directory.

‘Moment of lustfulness’

In an earlier mitigation hearing, the defence said that Chong was married with an unemployed older son and a younger son in school. Chong’s family relied on his monthly salary of approximately HK$90,000, the court heard.

Chong pleaded guilty earlier this month because he said that failing to do so after committing a crime would leave a bad impression on his sons.

According to an earlier court document, Chong followed the victim along Mong Kok’s Tung Choi Street on November 14 last year.

Police officers on patrol noticed Chong acting suspiciously while following the woman, holding his phone at a 45-degree angle beneath her. After intercepting him, they found a 17-second video showing the victim’s underwear on his phone.

Under caution, Chong admitted to acting in “a moment of lustfulness,” and begged the officers to give him a second chance.

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James Lee is a reporter at Hong Kong Free Press with an interest in culture and social issues. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English and a minor in Journalism from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where he witnessed the institution’s transformation over the course of the 2019 extradition bill protests and after the passing of the Beijing-imposed security law.

Since joining HKFP in 2023, he has covered local politics, the city’s housing crisis, as well as landmark court cases including the 47 democrats national security trial. He was previously a reporter at The Standard where he interviewed pro-establishment heavyweights and extensively covered the Covid-19 pandemic and Hong Kong’s political overhauls under the national security law.