COURT: The defendant has been charged and pleaded guilty in the Magistrates Court to two counts of trafficking in dangerous drugs. The 1st count is trafficking in 35.77 grammes of a crystalline solid containing 34.53 grammes of methamphetamine hydrochloride and the 2nd count is for trafficking in 12.58 grammes of a mixture containing 3.96 grammes of heroin hydrochloride.
The Summary of Facts shows that on the evening of 18 August 2012, the defendant was intercepted in Kowloon Tong and, upon a search of his person, three plastic bags of the drugs the subject matter of the 1st count were found in his trouser pocket.
Under caution, the defendant admitted that he had bought the "Ice" for $80,000 for his own consumption and that the unconsumed part is to be sold to others to have the costs covered. The street value of the dangerous drug involved in the 1st count was, at the date of the arrest, was $27,042. So it would appear that a large part of what he had bought had already been dispersed.
Subsequently, the defendant was taken back to his home in Wong Tai Sin. In his bedroom were found 17 packets of the heroin which is the subject matter of the 2nd count. Also found was a weighing scale, resealable plastic bags, a pair of scissors and a lighter.
Subsequently, the Government Chemist also analysed a plastic bag which contained 49.58 grammes of caffeine. This was no doubt used as something to mix with the drugs. But in any event, that is not in the Summary of Facts and I will not hold that against the defendant. I will treat the caffeine as having gone unexplained.
Under caution, at his home, the defendant then said that the white powder is for his own consumption and some will be sold to others to earn some money.
In a video-recorded interview, the defendant admitted that he had bought the "Ice" from a friend and that he consumes 1 to 2 grammes of "Ice" a day. He worked, at that time, as a casual forklift truck driver, earning five thousand or six thousand dollars a month. He also admitted that he used the weighing scale found at his home, and scissors and white plastic bag, to package heroin at his home. He claimed he consumes 0.5 grammes of heroin a day and takes it three to four times a day.
The street value of the "Ice" found, as I have mentioned, in the 1st count was $27,042 and the heroin in the 2nd count was $10,554.
Mr Pun, on behalf of the defendant, has submitted not only a very well thought out and well prepared mitigation on behalf of the defendant but has done his best to look up cases in order to assist the defendant.
The background of the defendant is that he is aged 32 and had a similar offence in that he was convicted of possession of dangerous drugs in 2002 and sentenced to a Drug Addiction Treatment Centre. So at the age of 22 or thereabouts, he had already been given a chance to get rid of his drug habit and sent to a Drug Addiction Treatment Centre to help him get rid of his addiction. He did not value that experience and fell back into addiction.
According to the letters which were submitted, he was employed as a tally clerk from the year 2003 to 2010. According to that letter, he resigned of his own accord. When arrested, he was only working as a casual worker and yet, he has to support his family, so how, one wonders, he can support his family and, at the same time, support his own drug addiction when earning five thousand to six thousand dollars a month as a casual worker.
The defendant is very lucky that he has the support of the two women in his life, his mother and his wife. His mother and his wife, their misery, their depression, stems from the defendant, I have no doubt.
The only mitigation in this case is really the fact that the defendant had pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity.
The defendant claims that he bought the drugs for his own consumption and sells some of it in order to get money to supply his own addiction and so, therefore, Mr Pun submits to this court that there should be a reduction in the sentence, taking into account the fact that some of the drugs are for his own consumption. Mr Pun prays in aid the case of HKSAR v Wong Suet Hau & Anor reported in 2002 1 HKLRD 69, and the factors to be taken into account by a sentencing court when a defendant pleads in mitigation that part of the drugs were for his own consumption.
Taking into account the quantity of the drugs, the circumstances, which I have already mentioned in the Admitted Facts, of the packaging of the drugs which he was carrying in his trousers and also there was paraphernalia found at his home for packaging the heroin, and the fact that the defendant was only a casual worker earning five to six thousand dollars a month and he had to support his family, I do not accept that a large part of the drugs were for his own consumption.
Looking at the totality of the drugs and the guidelines laid down, as Mr Pun pointed out, for "Ice" in Ching Kwok Hung and the guideline laid down for heroin in the case of Lau Tak Ming, I consider that adding the two quantities together, it would give an overall starting point of about 8½ years. I also accept Mr Pun’s submission that because of the proximity of time between the two discoveries, that there should be concurrent sentences imposed.
In relation to the 1st count, which is the trafficking in the "Ice" of 34.53 grammes of methamphetamine hydrochloride, I would impose a starting point of 8½ years, reducing that by 1 year for self-consumption. Then from the 7½ years, I take one-third off because of the defendant’s early plea and the defendant therefore is sentenced to 5 years’ imprisonment.
In relation to the 2nd count, I agree with Mr Pun that the starting point should be 2 years, and reducing it to 18 months because I take into account the fact of his self-consumption, then reducing that by one-third, giving us a sentence of 12 months’ imprisonment.
The defendant will go to prison for 12 months on the 2nd count, but the 12 months on the 2nd count will be served concurrently with the sentence on the 1st count.