HKSAR v. LAI CHI WAI

HCCC18/2009

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CRIMINAL CASE NO. 18 OF 2009

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Transcript of the Audio Recording
of the Sentence in the above case

COURT:  Lai Chi-wai, as you know, trafficking in any type of dangerous drugs is rightly considered a serious criminal offence.  The maximum penalty provided by law is one of life in prison.  The Court of Appeal has long said that heavy penalties are to be imposed on all persons who in any way engage in this filthy trade.  The Court of Appeal has also set very clear guidelines as to how all judges and magistrates should sentence drug traffickers.  Judges and magistrates are expected to follow those guidelines unless there are very strong reasons for them not to do so.  There are no such very strong reasons in your case.

I am prepared to accept that your intention in relation to the ketamine was to give it away to friends and acquaintances.  Nevertheless, giving away dangerous drugs is still trafficking in them.

There is nothing in your background or in the circumstances of the commission of your two crimes which is of any mitigating value.  It is no excuse that you intended to use some of the proceeds of the sale of the cocaine to help pay your elder brother’s debts.

Your only mitigation, and it is a powerful mitigation, is your co-operation with the police and your pleas of guilty this morning.  Those pleas of guilty certainly show realism on your part and acceptance of the inevitable and also, to some extent, they indicate a degree of remorse.  You are entitled to expect and you will receive, a reduction in sentence because of those guilty pleas.

Of the two drugs that you trafficked in, cocaine is by far the more serious one.  The scourge of cocaine is known throughout the world.  Its illicit use in Hong Kong is becoming more and more common, and its damaging effects, both to those who take it and to society in general, are recognised as being as severe as the damaging effects caused by heroin.

Ketamine is recognised as a less harmful drug.  Nevertheless, it is rightly regarded as a dangerous drug and controlled as such.  Quite why anyone would want to take a drug one of whose main lawful uses is to tranquillise horses, I have no idea.

Following the guidelines I have already spoken of, the length of sentence that judges are expected to pass on drug traffickers for the cocaine offence, which is the second of the two charges you face, means you would have been facing a prison sentence of at least 5½ years had you been found guilty of that offence after trial.  For the ketamine offence, the first of the two counts, after trial, a sentence of 4 years’ imprisonment would have been amply justified.

Of course, total sentences of 9½ years for the two offences would be regarded as excessively high for your two offences.  A reduction to an overall sentence of 6 years’ imprisonment after trial would be justified.  That is the starting point sentence that I am taking in calculating what your sentences should be.

I am taking account of your guilty pleas, and I am reducing that overall sentence to one of 4 years’ imprisonment, a discount of one-third.

As individual sentences have to be passed for your two offences, they are as follows:

for the 2nd count, the trafficking in the cocaine, your sentence is one of 3 years and 8 months’ imprisonment, a one-third discount from 5½ years;

 for the 1st count, the trafficking in ketamine, your sentence is one of 2 years and 8 months’ imprisonment, a one-third discount from a 4 year sentence after trial.

 I am ordering that your sentence on the 2nd count, that of the trafficking in the cocaine, be partly consecutive to your sentence on the 1st count, the trafficking in the ketamine.  You will start to serve your sentence on the 2nd count once you have served the first 4 months of your sentence on the 1st count.

This means that your total period of imprisonment will be one of 4 years.