HK star Jacky Cheung's Filipino maid jailed for 6 months

First posted 19:11:56 (Mla time) December 12, 2006
Agence France-Presse




HONG KONG -- The Filipino house maid of veteran Hong Kong pop star Jacky Cheung has been jailed for six months after stealing photographs and a letter from her boss, media reports said Tuesday.

Preslyn-saga Catacutan, 30, said she took the items to keep as souvenirs because she was a fan of the 45-year old star.

But magistrate Winston Leung told the court he believed Catacutan had intended to sell them.

"Common sense directed that the celebrity's personal items can be of high value," he told the court, a report in the South China Morning Post said. "Celebrities are prone to such betrayal."

The report of Monday's hearing said Cheung had discovered the theft after being tipped off by another maid. The photos were found in Catacutan's jeans pocket, it said.

Chueung is one of Hong Kong's biggest stars, rising to fame in the mid-1980s to become one of the so-called "Heavenly Kings of Song" along with fellow stars Aaron Kwok, Andy Lau and Leon Lai.

Like most Hong Kong stars, Cheung has been packaged as an all-round entertainer, starring in a number of hit local movies as well as singing Canto-pop, a hybrid of Chinese ballads and Western pop

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i want to kick his face off. he thinks he is very popular, i don't even know him. it is just a picture, there is many pictures of him in the web so why does a filipina will do that. narrow minded person. i wish karma will take revenge for the filipina... jackie... rest in peace, old man

^ why would you know him... he's a HK star

Another one of those idiots who bring disgrace to their country.

Ever heard of doing the right thing by asking?

wow, you need to re-read and evaluate what you said.

Bottom line is, she got caught stealing. It's a crime. She is serving time for what she did. Justice has been carried out. No big deal.

Stealing is still stealing !!! Bakit hindi na lang niya hinigi ang mga pictures ni Jacky Cheung?????

jackie cheung is quite popular. you just don't know him because you don't listen to canto music. lol.

i was just talking about jackie cheung an hour ago with my friend.

btw you just glorified the act of theft.

i can be ur maid hammy...i have to expose your private pictures

Couldnt he just give the maid a warning instead of sending her to jail right away?

I think what that HK star did was overkill. Okay, I agree that the Filipina D did hide those pictures...but, for Heaven's sake, what are pictures? He could have reprimanded the DH or even dismissed her employment, but brought her on court and eventually imprisoned her! I think, that's too much! I don't know if Chinese people believe in such word as "humane," "human dignity," or even "compassion?" Well, I do think that the star was born inside the mainland China were communism still rules!

chinese peeps in general hate theft...if you still from a chinese person and he/she knows about it, itll scare your image for the rest of your time with them...

she deserves it, why couldnt she just ask...

And the Philippine government did what...?

This is Jacky Cheung

Yes, the maid has made a mistake by taking those items without permission and she deserves some punishment. The items are most probably to be sold to some of the notorioius HK paparrazis. Jacky is a big star in HK and those items are be very valuable to the paparrazi and they may get published later on. This is intrusion of someone's privacy. This maid certainly deserves punishment to deter the others from doing the same thing but personally I think 6 months is just too long. A one month imprisonment should be sufficient enough to serve as a warning to other maids.
For a non celebrity this case would most probably ended up without any legal action and at the most the maid is deported but for a celebrity he may view the case differently.