The night took a turn near 5 a. He was spared jail time, sentenced to one year probation and ordered to receive drug counselling. He was also ordered to complete 45 hours of community service. After moving to Canada in , he went on a spending spree and soon owned a golf club, a security firm, a fitness centre, a yacht brokerage company, and a luxury car dealership with rights to Jaguar, Porsche and Rolls-Royce. Before long, he was serving on the Vancouver Police Board. He donated hundreds of thousands to the provincial Liberals, and even hired a former B.
But by the fall of he was in the headlines for another reason, both for the charges laid in the incident and his explanation for several police run-ins involving drugs and prostitutes. Ho told the Vancouver Province at the time, referring to prostitutes in the Downtown Eastside. Still, he maintains in a statement of facts that he offered to drive the woman home and only grabbed at her out of concern she would run away into the cold without a jacket or shoes.
The woman, the court heard, suffered agoraphobia and a fear of being murdered. The year-old father of three, who counts movie star Jackie Chan among his friends, has said he sometimes sleeps as little as 10 hours a week β a chronic insomniac.
He reportedly bought a police car once used as a movie prop and parked it outside his home as a scarecrow to burglars. He told journalist Peter C. Newman in that when he first arrived to Canada with his then-wife, he thought he would find horses to ride because it was in the Wild West. He holds passports to several countries.
On Thursday, his lawyer and the Crown asked the court to spare him jail time, to instead sentence him to one year on probation and drug rehab. Those close to Mr. Ho told the Vancouver Province in that he is no criminal, and is actually quietly helping young women break free from the gritty underworld of drugs and prostitution.
