A top court in Hong Kong granted Carson Yeung Ka Sing, Birmingham International Holdings Ltd. Chairman, release from jail Friday and will be free to appeal a money laundering conviction.?Yeung was released on HK$7 million (approx. US$900,000) cash bond and surety bond of HK$6 million. The Chairman is also part owner of the Birmingham England, UK soccer club Birmingham City.
Legal questions submitted by barrister Clare Montgomery QC were cited by Chief Justice Geoffrey Ma Tao Li as the reason for granting Yeung leave to appeal. The appeal hearing will take place May 31 of next year.
Legal trouble continues to mount for the 55 year-old Yeung who was arrested and charged with five counts of money laundering in 2011, two years after acquiring the soccer club, and convicted by Judge Douglas Yau last year of laundering HK$720 million between 2001 and 2007. Judge Yeu who sentenced Yeung to six years said the soccer team owner lied about the origin of almost HK$100 million in his bank accounts, saying Yeung’s testimony was “self-contradictory” and he was “making it up as he went along”.
Yeung must report to authorities on The Peak three times a week and must not leave Hong Kong, all part of his conditional release. While Yeung vacated his chairmanship of the Birmingham City soccer club prior to last year’s money laundering conviction, he is still majority shareholder of the club’s Hong Kong-listed parent company, Birmingham International Holdings Ltd.
Receivers Ernst & Young are in negotiations with the club’s preferred bidder and have been running Birmingham International Holdings Ltd. since February, while trading of Birmingham International was suspended in December