THE QUEEN v. TSANG WING MING

Headnote

Sentence for going equipped for stealing

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JUDGMENT

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Cons, V.P., delivered the judgment of the Court:

1. On 15th December, 1988, the Applicant, TSANG Wing Ming, was arrested while behaving suspiciously at 5 o'clock in the morning. He was in fact climbing a scaffolding in a rear lane. He was wearing gloves and later found to have on his person a screwdriver and a small torch. He resisted the constables who were arresting him by trying to run away, but after a struggle was subdued.

2. In due course he was convicted by Judge Caird in the District Court of going equipped for stealing, contrary to Sec. 27(1) of the Theft Ordinance, and of resisting a police officer in the due execution of his duty, contrary to S. 36(b) of the Offences Against the Person Ordinance. He was sentenced for the first offence to two years and six months, and for the second to three months, the sentences to run consecutively. He now seeks leave to appeal against both sentences.

3. He is a man of 28 years of age and has a record which the judge below described as      "deplorable". It started with a conviction for theft at the age of 20 and he now has amassed nine appearances in court with convictions mostly for the offence of burglary. He has been sentenced to a series of small terms of imprisonment, the last one in June 1987 being for 18 months.

4. We do not know what mitigation, if any, was put forward to the judge below. Nothing to his credit has been mentioned in this Court. Mr. Fok, who appears for him, has based his application mainly upon a comparison of sentences imposed for actual burglary for which the maximum sentence is 14 years, as against the maximum of three years for going equipped for stealing. That, of course, must be reserved for the most serious offences of its kind. Mr. Fox suggests that these should be confined to persons carrying sophisticated equipment such as arc welders, glass cutters and the like. We do not necessarily agree. The nature of the equipment carried is a matter for consideration. But in a crime of this unusual and "preventive" nature, of more importance is the nature of the Defendant. The judge below concluded that the Defendant in this instance was a professional burglar. We have no hesitation in agreeing and, bearing that in mind. We do not think the sentence of two and a half years for going equipped for stealing was manifestly excessive. Nor do we think that the totality of two years and nine months, when the three months for resisting arrest is added thereto, is manifestly excessive.

5. For these reasons we refuse the application for leave to appeal against sentence.