During senior pastor Kong Hee's appeal on Thursday, his lawyer Edwin Tong stated that all three charges brought against him for criminal breach of trust needed to be overturned. The hearing was held in a packed courtroom at the High Court, with the pastor's wife Sun Ho present as well.
Kong Hee, along with five other leaders of the church, had been convicted last November, and sentenced to prison time ranging from 21 months to 8 years, as Channel News Asia published.
The charges brought against the condemned was one that involved misappropriating $50 million worth of the City Harvest Church's money. Among the six members convicted, pastor Kong Hee received the longest sentence of eight years in prison, as he had been accused of three charges for conspiracy to commit criminal breach of trust.
According to another report on Channel News Asia, Judge See Kee Oon, who had presided over the hearing, discovered that Kong had channeled millions of dollars of the church's funds, which had originally been earmarked for investments and building expenses, into fraudulent bonds. Eventually, these resources were used to support his wife's music career.
The pastor's lawyer had argued that Kong had not intended to misappropriate the church's funds, and had only put the resources to uses that would help the church with its mission. According to Tong, virtually all of the congregation had supported Kong Hee. The logic behind the argument was that in funding his wife's music career, Kong Hee had supposedly believed to be acting in the interests of the church, as her singing career was synonymous with the Crossover Project, which is the church's project aimed at reaching out to non-Christians through pop music.
The lawyer had further defended the pastor, explaining that even if the uses that the monies had been put to were to considered as wrongful, it did not imply that Kong Hee had been dishonest.
"It is beyond question that the accused believed wholeheartedly that they were using church funds for an approved church purpose," the lawyer had declared.
The appeal that came to pass on Thursday was the first of five appeals by the six condemned church leaders. Meanwhile, the prosecution has lodged an appeal against the inadequate prison terms of the six leaders, and is likely to present its case on Tuesday.