A 19-year-old man has been convicted of sedition in Hong Kong after writing anti-government graffiti in a commercial building restroom, in violation of the city’s national security law. The verdict was handed down at West Kowloon Court on Tuesday.

Leung Kai-lok, who works part-time as a clerk at the Vanuatu consulate located in China Hong Kong City in Tsim Sha Tsui, pleaded guilty to three counts of criminal damage but denied committing a seditious act. The graffiti, which included death threats against former chief executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and her successor John Lee Ka-chiu, was scrawled inside a men’s toilet between July 17 and 21 last year.

Surveillance footage introduced during the trial showed Leung entering the restroom shortly before the graffiti was discovered. The messages contained calls for Hong Kong independence, condemnation of the police, and critical statements aimed at the city’s leadership. On July 21, a national security police officer apprehended Leung after he was found writing similar slogans in the same restroom.

Leung admitted to creating the graffiti as an expression of dissatisfaction with the authorities. He said he tried to avoid detection by hiding in a bathroom cubicle and attempting to flee when he realized police were investigating.

The defendant’s legal team presented a psychiatric report arguing that Leung was affected by autism spectrum disorder and acute dissociative reactions triggered by stress, which impaired his ability to fully understand the nature and consequences of his actions. Dr. Wong Chung-kwong, the defence psychiatrist, claimed that Leung’s obsessive thoughts related to the 2019 anti-government protests and external disturbance from a mentally unstable individual contributed to the behavior.

However, the prosecution’s psychiatric expert, Dr. Paul Tam Mo-shing, refuted these claims, stating there was insufficient clinical evidence that Leung was autistic or mentally impaired at the time of the offenses. Chief Magistrate Victor So Wai-tak accepted Dr. Tam’s assessment, finding that the defence’s psychiatric opinion lacked rigorous professional basis and was largely founded on hearsay.

The magistrate concluded that Leung possessed the intellectual and cognitive capacity to understand the messages he had written. He highlighted that the graffiti explicitly called for Hong Kong's independence, challenged the “one country, two systems” framework, vilified the police by associating them with corruption and abuse of power, and issued personal threats against top government officials.

Leung was previously held in custody for nearly a month and was released on bail before being re-arrested for sentencing, which is scheduled for August 12.