An airport ground worker has been jailed for nearly three years for stealing more than HK$3 million (US$384,600) from a primary school friend who paid her to buy surgical masks at the start of the coronavirus epidemic in Hong Kong last year.
Sit Man-ying, 33, a customer service officer of Hong Kong Airport Services, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cathay Pacific Airways, was jailed for 33 months after she pleaded guilty on Monday to five counts of theft totalling HK$3,321,726. She denied five alternative counts of fraud, which were left on court file.
The District Court heard Sit had reached out to a schoolmate, Lam Hiu-ling, with whom she maintained loose contact, and claimed she had the means to source masks from Indonesia and Japan for sale.