Hong Kong Arrests 29 People in Bribery Case for Memberships in Jockey Club

Twenty-nine people were arrested for suspected bribery related to applications for membership in the Hong Kong Jockey Club, the city’s Independent Commission Against Corruption said today.

Three voting members of the club, which operates Hong Kong’s horse races and lottery and donates proceeds to charitable causes, are accused of taking payoffs from applicants to support their bid to join, the anti-graft agency said in a statement on its website.

The investigation, code-named “Pilot,” led to arrests of the voting members and an unspecified number of non-voting members, middlemen and people seeking to join, the ICAC said.

The Jockey Club is cooperating with the probe, the statement said.

Earlier this year former Wharf (Holdings) Ltd. director John Terence Hung lost an appeal of his conviction for taking bribes to support a Jockey Club membership application, Radio Television Hong Kong reported June 30.

The two cases are unrelated, ICAC spokesman Alan Tse said by telephone today.

Editors: Dirk Beveridge, Douglas Wong

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Marco Lui at mlui11@bloomberg.net