A trade show exhibitor was jailed for a fortnight and fined for selling fake cosmetic devices at a trade show in the Hong Kong Convention Centre earlier this month.
The exhibitor was convicted at the Eastern Magistrates’ Courts yesterday (November 26) on a charge of supplying for the purpose of trade cosmetic apparatus to which a false trade description was applied in contravention of the Trade Descriptions Ordinance. He was sentenced to 14 days’ imprisonment and one set of cosmetic apparatus valued at about $31,000 was confiscated.
Seven other exhibitors had earlier been convicted on the same charge on November 13 at the Eastern Magistrates’ Courts. They were each fined from $5000 to $8000, and seven sets of cosmetic apparatus, valued at $155,000 in total, were confiscated.
Acting on information, Customs officers from the Trade Descriptions Investigation Bureau conducted an operation on November 12 at a trade fair held in Wan Chai and seized eight sets of cosmetic apparatus.
Eight exhibitors were arrested. The apparatus, claimed to be of a particular brand, were found to be not authorised to be manufactured and supplied. The exhibitors applied false trade description to the apparatuses to mislead customers into believing that they were products of the brand.
According to the Trade Descriptions Ordinance, any person who has in his possession for any purpose of trade goods to which a false trade description is applied commits an offence. Upon conviction, offenders may be subject to a maximum fine of $500,000 and imprisonment of five years.