Hong Kong hotel accounting manager jailed for 6 years over HK$26 million fraud

A 39-year-old former accounting manager has been sentenced to six years and six months’ imprisonment after stealing more than HK$26 million (US$3.35 million) from his former employer, the Four Seasons Hotel in Hong Kong, over four years.

The High Court heard that Chan Yiu-choi, who is married and has an eight-year-old daughter, stole the money by issuing 112 forged cheques from the hotel to his personal bank or credit card accounts between July 2017 and September 2021.

Chan had worked his way up from a waiter to an accounting manager at the hotel between 2014 and 2021, earning around HK$38,000 per month before his arrest.

He used the stolen funds to buy a flat for HK$5.88 million in Tseung Kwan O in 2019, as well as a Porsche sports car in 2020 for more than HK$1.2 million.

The funds also financed a lavish lifestyle which included buying numerous luxury handbags, watches and jewellery, which were later recovered from another residence in Sai Ying Pun.

Handing down the sentence on Wednesday, Mr Justice Douglas Yau Tak-hong emphasised the significant breach of trust involved in Chan’s crimes and the necessity of a deterrent sentence. He adopted a starting point of 10 years’ imprisonment, reducing it by one-third due to Chan’s guilty pleas to nine charges of theft.

“The thefts were committed over a period of around four years. During this long period, the defendant had forged signatures and altered computer records in the process of stealing and their concealment on multiple occasions,” he said.