Edison Chen, the Chinese-Canadian pop star embroiled in a sex scandal after thousands of lurid photos were released last year, appeared in British Columbia Supreme Court today. He testified against Ho Chun Sze, the man accused of accessing Chen's laptop and the photos of him in bed with Hong Kong celebrities, according to The Guardian, which describes the scandal.
Dozens of new pictures, many highly explicit, were uploaded each day, gradually identifying more women. Eight of the territory's best-known singers and actors appear in the images.
"It was more of an attack, a well-planned attack in the way these images were released," Chen said.
Chen claimed Sze stole the pictures off his computer when he took it in for repairs, the Guardian also reported.
Chen was forced to identify several of the women in the photographs, many of whose careers were ruined when the photos were released, reported the Hong Kong Standard.
Chen stressed most of the photos were taken by him between 2001 and 2006 and were for his own possession. He admitted one of the women took about 40 photos and burned them onto a disc and gave it to him.
"This was never meant for anyone else to see," Chen said, adding that "everything was consensual."
The former singer-actor also told the Canadian courts that he believed he deleted the photos from his computer and suspected foul play on the part of the Sze and the computer store, reported the Globe and Mail.
He believed he had erased the files by putting them into the trash, before the machine was taken to the repair shop. "I did not know about encrypted data or securing the trash. In my opinion, when you deleted a file and put it in the trash bin, it was deleted," he said, adding that he later found out that files deleted from the trash could be recovered in some cases.
"They invaded my privacy and stole my things in a very direct way," Mr. Chen told the court.
Mr. Sze's trial will begin in Hong Kong on April 6. An international treaty between Canada and Hong Kong allows the two countries to provide legal assistance in criminal matters, according to the Globe and Mail.