HKSAR v. LO CHUN HEI

DCCC 39/2013

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

CRIMINAL CASE NO 39 OF 2013

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Reasons for Sentence

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1. Lo Chun-hei, you have been convicted on your own plea of the offence of burglary of the sum of $3,500 on 10 October last year.

2. The premises at which the burglary occurred was a restaurant in the Lee Theatre Plaza in Causeway Bay where you had been working.

3. On the day of the offence, you resigned your position with the restaurant as you knew that the restaurant was about to close down and you had obtained another job.  You returned the keys that you had been given to the manager’s office and the main gate to the supervisor who placed them in an unlocked drawer.

4. When the restaurant closed for the day, the restaurant was locked up and you left with the other staff.  The day’s takings of $16,900 had been put in the safe in the manager’s office.  Unknown to the supervisor and the staff of the restaurant, you had taken back the keys to the premises from the drawer in which they had been placed.  Almost half an hour after leaving the restaurant, you returned to the restaurant and gained entrance to the premises and stole $3,500 from the safe.  You had previously heard the supervisor tell a member of the staff the password to the safe. 

5. After your arrest you told the police that you had spent $1,800 of the money you had taken on beauty products, $500 you had put on your Octopus card and you kept the remaining $1,200. 

6. As you have been told by your legal advisers, the normal starting point for adults, first offender adults, who burgle non-domestic premises is 2½ years’ imprisonment.

7. Although the offence you committed was burglary, for the purpose of sentence, I shall treat it as a case of theft from your employer.  The fact that you spent more than half of the proceeds of the burglary on beauty products indicates that this was not an offence committed out of financial need. 

8. In mitigation, I have been told by Mr Lee that this was not an offence you had planned before submitting your resignation.  It was normal practice to change the password of the safe when an employee resigned.  You happened to hear the supervisor telling another staff member the new password and the idea then came to you to commit this offence. 

9. As you know, this was a serious offence and thoroughly dishonest.  I take into account that you are a young man of previous good character who has worked continuously since leaving school.  You are already in a new job and your new employer has sent a letter to the court confirming that you are performing well in your new employment.  Equally significantly, you have made full repayment of the sum you stole to your former employer. 

10. In my view, the appropriate starting point in this case is a sentence of 1 year’s imprisonment.  You pleaded guilty to this offence and that indicates your remorse, and you are accordingly entitled to the usual discount of one-third.  The resulting sentence is one of 8 months’ imprisonment. 

11. I have gone on to consider whether in the circumstances of this case it is necessary that you should serve an immediate term of imprisonment.  I have come to the conclusion, bearing in mind the fact that you are in new employment, the fact you have made full restitution and that you are of previous good character, that you should have the chance to prove that nothing like this will ever happen again.  I am therefore prepared to suspend the sentence of 8 months’ imprisonment for 2 years.  That means that if in the next 2 years you commit an offence punishable by imprisonment, you are liable to be punished not only for that offence but to have this sentence activated and in normal circumstances that would be consecutive to any sentence that will be passed on any further offence.  I hope this is the very last time you will ever see the inside of a courtroom.