190313三午後雲：For the Lower Mattan Court, New York City

Lower Manhattan Court
New York, New York
USA

The Honorable Judge
Regarding: Case of Mr. Ho, Chi Ping Patrick

Your Honor,

I am a Hong Kong resident. I don't know Mr. Ho, Chi Ping Patrick, a Hong Kong resident and Chinese national convicted in an international bribery case, in person. Only met him once while I was still a journalist. All my knowledge of him is news headlines when he was a high official of the HK SAR Government and later when he was caught up in New York in the present case.

News from New York especially the Lower Manhattan Court caught my attention. During the first half of 1980s, I was a journalist working for Chinese language papers for more than six years. For more than a year, I lived in Jersey City and took the PATH to World Trade Center about 5AM in the morning and walked to my workplace on Grand Street, Chinatown, passing by the Lower Manhattan Court which was famous for landmark cases like putting organized crimes like the Gambino family in jail. To journalists, your court is a monument.

I don't doubt the charges that landed Mr. Ho in jail.The prosecution must have done a thorough work. The law is the law. With the rule of law, everyone has to pay his or her due.

And I must say, Chinese people have a mentality. They are so proud of their 5,000 years of uninterrupted culture and heritage and so ashamed of their humiliation by western powers in the last 200 years that some of them may go out of the way to help their country get rich and strong as quickly as possible. In this way, they may infringe on the interests and rights of other people.
It is definitely wrong to use unfair tactics to offset competition. In this respect, I can understand the Court's decision.

But allow me to quote a Chinese saying, “法律不外乎人情”, which with my limited English, may translate into "At the end, the law is nontheless human concern (or compassion)"
This Chinese mentality may sound strange in accordance with the rule of law. And I am not saying that Mr. Ho should walk free. He is responsible for he did. But bribery seems to me somewhat different from crimes involving violence or coersion. The competitor is hurt but nobody is injured physically. Would there be a room to consider an early parole and pay his due with  community service? If necessary, do it in the States.

Mr Ho, as a top eye doctor trained in the States, can help to treat New York patients as community service. I am sure Lower Manhattan underprivileged eye patients would welcome his next 10 years in the community, not limited to people of Chinese descent, but also African Americans, Hispanics,... whoever has limited resources.

I recently watched the TV series "New Amsterdam", about a fictitious government hospital in Manhattan undergoing a management revolution led by a secular Jesus. If it is a utopia, it is the most impressive one that I want to believe.

I am writing to you in a hospital bed using my cell phone after reading the plead for Mr. Ho in Hong Kong papers this morning. I am temporarily bound to bed because of a spinal fracture last week, not knowing whether I will be able to move freely again. So far the doctors, nurses, ward helpers are very good. I have no complaints but my own carelessness. But I am still hopeful of a paradise when people are seriously sick and desperately want service.

I am especially concerned about the States because I spent 15 years there, lived in Providence, Chicago, Princeton, New York City. I received my PH.D in chemistry from the University of Chicago. I consider New York my second home.

Thank you for your attention.

Tsui, So Ming 崔少明
Hong Kong resident