The chief justice of

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a List of cities in China, city and Special administrative regions of China, special ...

was, until 1997, the chief judge (, later 首席大法官) of the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of Hong Kong and the most senior judge in the court system.

Supreme Court of Hong Kong

The

Supreme Court of Hong Kong The Supreme Court of Hong Kong was the highest court in Hong Kong prior to the transfer of sovereignty of Hong Kong from the United Kingdom to the People's Republic of China in 1997 and heard cases of first instance and appeals from the Di ...

existed from 1844 (before the establishment of the court (1841-1844), legal proceedings would likely have been undertaken by the British military courts and commanding officers) when British civilian control of Hong Kong commenced until 1997 when Hong Kong was returned to China. Only the last chief justice,

Sir Ti-liang Yang Sir Ti-liang Yang, (; born 30 June 1929) is a retired senior Hong Kong judge. He was the Chief Justice of Hong Kong from 1988–1996, the only ethnic Chinese person to hold this office during British colonial rule. He was a candidate in the ...

, was Chinese by ethnicity (British subject, later a British Dependent Territory citizen); the remainder were all British or Irish, two of whom, Sir James Russell and Sir Joseph H. Kemp, both Irishmen, spoke Chinese.

Renaming of Supreme Court and title in 1997

In 1997 the

was renamed the

High Court of Hong Kong The High Court of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is a part of the legal system of Hong Kong. It consists of the Court of Appeal and the Court of First Instance; it deals with criminal and civil cases which have risen beyond the ...

. The position was accordingly changed to ''Chief Judge of the High Court'', while the role of head of the Hong Kong Judiciary was assumed by the

chief justice of the Court of Final Appeal The chief justice of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal, sometimes informally known as the chief justice of Hong Kong, is the head of the Judiciary of Hong Kong and the chief judge of the Court of Final Appeal. The chief justice is one of t ...

. The Court of Final Appeal was established to replace the role of the

Judicial Committee of the Privy Council The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC) is the highest court of appeal for the Crown Dependencies, the British Overseas Territories, some Commonwealth countries and a few institutions in the United Kingdom. Established on 14 Aug ...

as Hong Kong's final appellate court.

List of pre-1997 chief justices

The following table lists former chief justices of the

prior to 1997. See the

for a list of chief judges of the High Court.

References

{{British dependencies chief justices, state = collapsed Supreme Court (Hong Kong) *

Supreme Court of Hong Kong

Renaming of Supreme Court and title in 1997

List of pre-1997 chief justices

See also

References