Why have sexual crimes among young people increased in Hong Kong and how can the problem be solved?

Hong Konger Hugo Leung* was 16 and in high school when police officers came to his home and arrested him for having sex with an underage girl.

The pair had met on social media and chatted online for a month before meeting for the first time and eventually having sex at her home.

The girl’s parents discovered this through her phone and called the police. Leung was sentenced to 160 hours of community service.

Now 18, he told the Post that their sexual encounter happened impulsively and he believed it was consensual because they had exchanged sexually suggestive messages via Instagram.

“I was curious about what it felt like, especially since my friends often talked about their experiences,” he said, adding that the rest of his knowledge about sex came mainly from pornography.

Leung said he did not know the girl’s age and was concerned when he was arrested. “I wasn’t sure what was going to happen to me,” he said.

Having stopped having contact with the girl after being banned from contact with her, he said: “I should have been less impulsive and thought carefully before doing it.”