Hong Kong people have more confidence in the local judicial system after 1997 than before, according to the Director of Public Prosecution Grenville Cross.

He said this yesterday as he reviewed the work of the Department of Justice' Prosecutions Division at a press conference.

Cross pointed out that the division had pursued 215,302 cases in the courts in 2006, as compared with 222,786 cases in 2005.

Last year, the prosecutors also gave 14,985 legal advices on criminal cases versus 14,707 legal advices in the previous year.

As for convictions, the rates were 76.8 percent, 91.8 percent and 92.3 percent for the Magistrates Court, District Court and Court of First Instance in 2006 respectively against 73.5 percent, 87.5 percent and 90.4 percent in the year before.

The year 2006 was full of challenges and changes, he said.

It was during the year that the prosecution policy was scrupulously applied, modernization was vigorously pursued, and closer liaison with counterparts in other places was actively promoted.

On the question of increasing number of briefing-out cases, Cross said criminal cases are currently getting more global and complicated in nature.

The cases cover diverse areas such as copyright crime, money laundering and Basic Law and corruption.

For cases heard by the Court of Final Appeal, the number of cases processed and conducted by the Prosecutions Division from 1997 to 2006 far exceeded the number that proceeded to the Privy Council in London before the reunification.

During the period from January 1988 to June 1997, 113 Hong Kong cases were heard by the Privy Council.

However, for the same period between July 1997 and December 2006, a total of 829 criminal cases were handled by the Court of Final Appeal.

"Some of the cases were very serious but some of them were minor cases," he added.

"The main reason why more cases are heard by the Court of Final Appeal was people no longer need to bring the final appeal cases to London and the cost is therefore less expensive.

"It is also welcoming to note that people have greater confidence in the post-1997 judicial system in Hong Kong," he said.

(HK Edition 04/20/2007 page6)