Hong Kong police are treating the deaths of five dogs found on Sunday beside fish ponds in San Tin, near Mai Po in the New Territories, as animal cruelty. Poisoning is suspected, not a closed forensic finding. Nobody has been arrested.

A passer-by called around 11:35am after seeing four carcasses by a pond in Hop Shing Wai. Officers found a fifth by the neighbouring pond. The Standard, citing sources, said all five were mongrels cared for by a 74-year-old pond worker surnamed Lee. He had checked them at noon on Saturday and found them well, then found them dead on Sunday morning.

A preliminary look found no visible wounds. Police estimated they had been dead about 24 hours. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals took the bodies. RTHK confirms the cruelty classification and that the border district crime unit has the file.

SCMP reported the same tally: four plus one, San Tin, suspected poison. Under Hong Kong's Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Ordinance, a conviction can bring a fine of up to HK$200,000 and three years in prison. That is the statutory maximum, not a sentence in this case.

Poison remains an investigative hypothesis. Without a lab result and without a suspect, five bodies by a pond are not a trial. Lee is a witness and a carer, not an accused person in the police account.

The northern ponds are a workplace and a home for dogs. On Sunday they became a scene of carcasses. Until tests return, it is an open cruelty file, with zero arrests and a cause a doctor has not yet named.

Image: Wpcpey, Mai Po marshes, 2016, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons; the area near San Tin, not the carcasses of 18 October 2026.

Sources consulted: 5 dogs found dead near San Tin fish ponds in suspected poisoning case - SCMP; Mai Po five mongrels suspected poisoned; police treat as animal cruelty - RTHK.