Hong Kong Triad Societies

Hong Kong's Triad societies trace their organizational forms to Qing-dynasty anti-Manchu brotherhoods such as the Tiandihui (Heaven and Earth Society) that spread through southern China and, after Hong Kong became a British colony in 1842, took root in the port city's underworld, controlling gambling, prostitution, drug trafficking and protection rackets through much of the twentieth century. By the early 1970s, syndicated Triad vice operations depended on routine, systemic bribery of the Royal Hong Kong Police, exposed dramatically in 1973 when Chief Superintendent Peter Godber was found to hold unexplained assets and fled the colony while under investigation, triggering mass public protest. The colonial government responded by establishing the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) in February 1974 as an anti-corruption body independent of the police, which pursued Godber's extradition and conviction and, through sustained investigation of the police-Triad nexus over the following decades, significantly curtailed Triad societies' ability to operate through police protection, pushing surviving groups toward less overt criminal activity.

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