Hong Kong court dismisses appeal of Cardinal Zen, 4 other trustees of protestor relief fund

A Hong Kong appeals court on Sept. 3 dismissed an appeal from five trustees, including 94-year-old Cardinal Joseph Zen, who were found guilty in 2022 of not registering the now-shuttered 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund as a society. The five plan to bring the case to the Court of Final Appeal, continuing the yearslong saga related to pro-democracy protests under the Hong Kong government. 

The fund was founded in June 2019, the same month protests broke out in Hong Kong over a controversial extradition bill. Hundreds of thousands of people, including now-imprisoned Catholic media mogul Jimmy Lai, took part in peaceful marches, according to Amnesty International Hong Kong. The fund financially supported protestors who were arrested or injured, and it announced its dissolution in August 2021, according to a Sept. 3 report from the Hong Kong Free Press.

This week, the Court of Appeal sided with a lower court that said the 612 Fund was a society and thus needed to apply for registration as a society under Hong Kong’s Societies Ordinance or seek an exemption from registration, according to the Hong Kong Free Press. The outlet noted that this case was the first prosecution of an alleged violation of this law. 

The West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts fined each of the persons with HK$4,000 ($510 in USD) after finding them guilty in November 2022 of not registering the fund. 

The five appealed the conviction, arguing that the fund was created as a trust, not a society, and that the ruling implied almost all groups that hold activities need to be registered as societies, according to the report. If this were the case, freedom of association would be infringed upon, they said. 

Barrister Margaret Ng, one of the trustees and a former lawmaker, told reporters Sept. 3 that the case is not only about the 612 fund but about the Societies Ordinance. 

“If whenever a group of people come together to do something it becomes a society that must apply for registration or an exemption with the police, this would have a huge impact on Hong Kong civil society,” she said, according to the report. 

She also confirmed the five would seek final appeal. 

According to the Hong Kong Free Press, Chief Judge of the High Court Jeremy Poon wrote in the Sept. 3 ruling, “We find that the appellants had all along intended to use the Fund as a vehicle to appeal for, collect and apply public donations for the purpose of supporting” the protests. The judges also considered the way the trustees conducted and managed the fund’s operations was “like a management committee or governing body, making decisions and [giving] instructions regarding its operations, including, importantly, how the donations were to be distributed.” According to the ruling, the fund had a one-month period after it was established to be registered or apply for an exemption.

The outlet reports that the five trustees were arrested in May 2022 “on suspicion of colluding with foreign forces under a Beijing-imposed national security law,” a situation separate from that of the fund. 

Zeale News previously reported that Cardinal Zen’s passport was confiscated after his arrest, which came as he had been an outspoken supporter of pro-democracy advocates and critical of Chinese government involvement in Church affairs. He was granted permission to leave Hong Kong in April 2025 to travel to Rome for Pope Francis’ funeral, and — less than a month later — he returned to the city where he has been a spiritual shepherd for years.