HONG KONG
A 31-year-old Hong Kong man found guilty of murdering his parents and dismembering their bodies was sentenced Monday to life in prison.
While handing down the sentence, Judge Michael Stuart-Moore told Henry Chau, “People may wonder why you did this. The fact there is no obvious answer is what makes you so dangerous."
The South China Morning Post quoted Stuart-Moore as saying, “You always blame your faults on other but not yourself... your parents became the victims of your blame."
On Friday, a member jury found Chau guilty of two counts of murder for the killings of his father Chau Wing-ki, 65, and his mother Siu Yuet-yee, 63, in 2013.
Stuart-Moore also sentenced Chau to an additional nine years and four months in jail for preventing the lawful burials of his parents, a charge which Chau and his co-accused, Tse Chun-kei, 38, had pleaded guilty to.
Tse was acquitted of the murder charges Friday, with the judge handing him a one-year sentence but ordering his release as he had already been in custody for two years.
Earlier, the court had been told that Chau's parents had gone with their son to Tse's flat March 1, 2013, and then disappeared.
A few days later, Henry Chau accompanied his elder brother, Chau Hoi-ying, to look for their parents. While making a police report, Chau sent a Whatsapp text messages to friends admitting to the killings.
Chau was arrested with Tse March 15, 2013.
Police found the bodies chopped into pieces, with their heads stored in two refrigerators in Tse's flat. Chau admitted he had knifed his parents to death and alleged Tse was his partner in crime.
Tse denied having been party to the plan, claiming Chau had shown him a box of human remains and threatened to hurt his mother.
In an earlier interview, Chau said he decided to kill his parents because they were the ones who put the most pressure on him.
He claimed his father was arrogant, never gave him a moment's peace, and would not lower the television volume when he tried to study as a student. He was also angry at his mother for looking at him sadly when he did not contribute to the family, and for humiliating him on his 24th birthday in front of the girl he loved.
"I thought that if I could resolve the emotional connection with my parents, it would be a solution... If they died, I could be reborn," he said in a video interview shown in the Court of First Instance Aug 10, 2014.
Chau claimed Tse was in charge of disposal of the bodies, suggesting that they covered the remains with cement and sand to disguise them as bricks, or cooked them so they resembled barbecued pork and could then be put out with the rubbish.
But the "bricks" were too heavy and the "meat" did not look like pork, the Post reported Chau as saying.
