The “Hello Kitty Murder,” as it has come to be known, is one of the most notorious crimes ever committed in Hong Kong. 

On February 8, 1999, a 15-year-old girl made a horrific discovery inside her apartment: an enormous Hello Kitty doll that had been carefully placed on her bed, with the head of 23-year-old Fan Man-yee carefully tucked inside. 

Fan Man-yee had been orphaned at a young age and left homeless before she became involved with the wrong person and met her untimely death.

This case attracts attention not only because the murder was committed in such an audacious way but also due to its heartbreaking backstory.

Despite being reared in a home for girls after her family left her at a young age and consequently developing a heroin addiction, Fan Man-yee was determined to make it on her own. 

As a 23-year-old, she managed to secure a position as a hostess in a nightclub.

It was then that she met 34-year-old Chan Man-Lok, an entrepreneur and drug dealer, who she shared an affinity with.

From these humble beginnings grew years of loyal service.

Fan Man-yee had resorted to theft as a means of enlisting money for both cash and narcotics.

In 1997, she unknowingly snatched the wallet of Chan Man-Lok, unaware that it contained $4,000 – her biggest score yet. 

She attempted to hastily flee with the locked bag but was apprehended just before she got away.

Although Fan thought she had gotten away with the heist, little did she know this would be her last criminal venture: Chan was the final victim of her crime spree.

Fan-men Yen murder 

Chan-Man-Lok hired two of his goons, Leung Shing-Cho and Leung Wai-Lun, to kidnap Man-yee as soon as he realized his money was gone.

In return for the cash she had taken from him, he wanted to force her into prostitution to profit from it. However, the scheme quickly spiraled out of control.

Fan Man-yee was soon tortured after the drug lord, and his goons realized that mere prostitution would not suffice.

For more than a month, they beat her, tied her up, burned her flesh, raped her, and had her consume human waste.

How did Fan Man-yee die? 

According to Ah Fong, Fan Man-yee passed away overnight after being tortured for a month.

While most experts believe her injuries ultimately killed her, Chan Man-Lok and his goons claimed she had died from a self-administered methamphetamine overdose.

Because there is no way to know for sure, they can only hypothesize. 

The supporters transferred Man-body yee’s to the bathtub in the flat and used a saw to cut her body apart after realizing she was dead.

Then, they fried each component of her corpse separately to prevent her from deteriorating and smelling like rotten flesh.

The murderers cooked the parts of her body and threw them away with the household rubbish on the same stove they were preparing dinner on.

But they did manage to save her head. 

They allegedly used the same cooking tools to stir their meals as they used to move her head about while it was being boiled on the stove before sewing her boiled skull into an enormous Hello Kitty mermaid doll.

They also preserved various internal organs and one of Fan Man-teeth, yee’s, which they saved in a plastic bag.

What happened to the criminals?

For indecently assaulting a 10-year-old child, one murderer who was found guilty in the Hello Kitty murder case in 1999 received a 12-month prison term.

Leung Shing-Cho, a defendant aged 48, was charged in the West Kowloon Magistrate’s Court.

The girl, his friend’s daughter, was allegedly touched by Leung when he pretended to give her a “massage” in a Tin Shui Wai apartment in December, the court heard.

Leung was deemed to have engaged in activity beyond “massage” and took advantage of the victim’s trust by Magistrate Jeffrey Sze Cho-you.

The Magistrate stated, “The degree of the sentence should examine the magnitude of the case provoking public hatred, along with the issue of preventing children’s legal rights from being violated.”

In 1999, Leung was one of the accused in a murder case. He and the other two defendants were charged with torturing and killing a woman by kidnapping and torturing her.

The murder case got its moniker after the victim’s body was mutilated and her head was placed inside a Hello Kitty doll.

Leung was initially given a life sentence after being found guilty in 2000 of homicide, wrongful detention, and preventing the proper burial of a deceased. Then he received a penalty.