The Hong Kong government has failed to help the families of the 12 Hongkongers arrested while trying to flee to Taiwan by boat, the father of one of the detainees said ahead of Monday’s closed-door trial in Shenzhen.

Nearly four months after they were caught and detained by the mainland coast guard, 10 of the Hongkongers will be tried at 2:30 p.m. at Yantian District People’s Court.

The father of one of the detainees, Lee Chi-yin, said families had hoped the local Security Bureau and Immigration Department would arrange a live-stream feed so they could watch the trial, but this seems unlikely to happen.

Lee’s father said he has tried but failed to contact the detainees’ government-appointed lawyers via WeChat.

He worries that the detainees and even the government-appointed lawyers will be prevented from defending themselves in the closed-door trial. Lee’s father hopes foreign consulates in Shenzhen will be allowed to send representatives to the trial.

The detainees’ families will probably be forced to accept the trial results, given the difficulty of filing appeals under the current circumstances, Lee’s father said. He hopes to visit his son in Shenzhen after the trial.

Live-stream feeds of court proceedings have become increasingly common in the mainland, according to Tam Yiu-chung, a member of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress. But according to Owen Chow, an activist helping the families of the 12, authorities are highly unlikely to live-stream this trial.

The families are planning to host a press conference on Monday afternoon regardless of the trial result, Chow said. According to Chinese law, families are allowed to visit detainees 10 days after a trial is concluded.

But Chow believes this trial will be unfair to the detainees and their families, whatever sentences are handed down, since the families have been denied access. Further, he said, lawyers hired by the families have been denied access to the detainees.

Chow said the families had hoped the 12 could return to Hong Kong soon or at least be made available for visits.

Letters of public support and encouragement would be important to the families and the detainees, Chow added.

The families of the 12 have published an open letter condemning the mainland Chinese government for trying Hongkongers in secret as well as barring the families and the media from attending the trial. Such actions violate the spirit of the “sunshine” judicial system that the mainland claims to advocate, the families said.

The Yantian court has said the trial will not be open to the public and the media. Although the trial results will not be publicized, they will be conveyed to the families by government-appointed lawyers, it said.

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