A lawyer from the United States convicted of assaulting a police officer in China in 2019 was deported back to U.S. soil after his release from a prison in Hong Kong.
Samuel Bickett, who was ordered to spend four months and two weeks in prison, announced on social media that he was deported from Chinese territory and is returning to the U.S.
“I offer my deepest thanks to the staff of the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong for their tireless efforts to ensure my release and safe departure from Hong Kong, as well as to my lawyers, friends, family, and supporters in Hong Kong and abroad,” Bickett said in a statement on his release.
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Bickett’s case stems from a 2019 physical confrontation with an off-duty police officer who was using a baton to hit a teenager suspected of not paying his subway fare. Bickett claimed the man did not identify himself as an officer and was using unnecessary force against the teenager. A judge dismissed Bickett’s request for an appeal in January, after which he finished the remainder of his sentence.
Once he got out, Bickett said his request to see his loved ones in China before he left was denied. Instead, he was escorted directly from the prison to an immigration detention center and then the airport, where he had a layover in Istanbul. Although he was not born in Hong Kong, Bickett said it had been his home for years and became passionate about fighting verbally against the Hong Kong government, which has increasingly come under control of mainland China in recent years despite protests by its residents.
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“Like many other Hongkongers, I have been forced to leave behind my loved ones in my city by an unelected government that, with open contempt for Hong Kong’s system of law and justice, has sought to destroy everything and everyone that makes our city exceptional,” Bickett said. “I have faith that one day I will be able to once again walk the streets of a Hong Kong ruled by law and governed with the consent of its people.”
