Abby Choi gave HK$2m for waffle shop to ‘bootlicker’ ex-brother-in-law, trial told

The mother of slain Hong Kong socialite Abby Choi Tin-fung has told a court that her daughter’s former brother-in-law was a “bootlicker” who coaxed her into funding an egg waffle shop and hiring him as a driver months before her death.

Choi’s mother, Cheung Yin-fa, said on Wednesday that Anthony Kwong Kong-kit had frequently sought financial support from her daughter before he allegedly joined his father and younger brother in a plot to murder her in February 2023.

“It is during the time when we were still on good terms that he kept saying he could not find a job. He is a really good bootlicker begging for mercy,” she said on the third day of her testimony at the High Court.

Kwong, 35, was Choi’s stand-in chauffeur when the 28-year-old model was allegedly attacked during a car journey she thought was to fetch her daughter from school on February 21, 2023.

He is standing trial on a joint count of murder alongside his father Kwong Kau, 68, and his younger brother, Alex Kwong Kong-chi, 31, who is Choi’s ex-husband.

Kwong Kau, a retired police sergeant, also denied preventing the lawful burial of Choi’s body between February 21 and 23. His two sons pleaded guilty to that offence before the trial.

The killing allegedly arose from a family feud over the proposed sale of a HK$72 million (US$9.17 million) flat at the Kadooria residential complex in Ho Man Tin. Kwong Kau, the property’s registered owner, allegedly resented Choi’s attempts to sell the luxury home and enlisted his two sons to help kill her so he could keep it for himself.

Cheung previously testified that the relationship between the two families broke down in June 2022. The elder Kwong was reportedly so opposed to the sale that he threatened to kill Choi and her whole family if she pressed ahead.

During cross-examination on Wednesday, the witness said the flat’s intended sale was part of her daughter’s effort to reclaim possession of assets she had given the Kwong family over the years.

“[She] realised this family was not good, so [she] wanted to take back the things she owned,” Cheung said.

She said her daughter had planned to spend about HK$20 million on a new flat in Tuen Mun for the two children she had with Alex Kwong, which would be closer to their school in the same district, although no purchase was made before the influencer’s death.

Defence counsel Trevor Beel, representing Anthony Kwong, sought to challenge Cheung’s suggestion that his client had been living off the influencer’s wealth before the alleged offences.

He claimed Choi’s former brother-in-law became her stand-in chauffeur at her request after she dismissed her previous driver in November 2022.

But Cheung maintained that Anthony Kwong and his family had persistently asked her daughter to hire him because he was jobless.

She said Choi reluctantly agreed to hire him on a three-month provisional basis, but still complained to her that he drove “very dangerously”.

The witness said Choi had also given Anthony Kwong about HK$2 million to run an egg waffle shop in Sham Shui Po after her former in-law begged her for money.

Cheung said that Anthony Kwong visited her “almost every day” for dinner after Choi stopped financing the business and the shop folded.

But Beel contended that Choi had never made significant financial contributions towards Anthony Kwong’s living expenses. The shop, he said, was set up by Choi simply because her two children loved egg waffles.

Cheung rejected that assertion and said Anthony Kwong did not repay anything Choi had lent him.

The court also heard on Wednesday that a police officer involved in handling the murder trial had approached Cheung via WeChat after she gave evidence on Tuesday.

The officer, identified as Detective Police Constable Ko Yan-kit, asked Cheung about the address of a flat at Whampoa Garden, which she said she co-owned with her husband.

Instead of supplying the address, she told the officer that she had given wrong evidence about the property’s ownership earlier in the day.

“Today I was angry … About Whampoa Garden, a long time has passed and at that time, I thought [the property] was registered jointly under our names, but I was mistaken because it was so many years ago,” she wrote in a message sent to Ko on Tuesday night.

Cheung told the court she was mistaken in previously claiming her daughter had not registered the Kadooria flat under her mother’s name because she would be required to pay double stamp duty due to the Whampoa Garden property.

Instead, the witness said on Wednesday the Kadooria flat was registered in Kwong Kau’s name because he was jobless and could “run around” for the influencer.

The trial continues before Deputy Judge Brian Keith and a nine-member jury.