HKSAR v. WONG MAN CHEUNG

HCCC 492/2015

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CRIMINAL CASE NO 492 OF 2015

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

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COURT: Mr Wong, you have pleaded guilty in the Eastern Magistracy on 18 December 2015 to one count of trafficking in dangerous drugs, contrary to section 4(1)(a) and (3) of the Dangerous Drugs Ordinance, Cap 134, and one count of possession of dangerous drugs, contrary to section 8(1)(a) and (2) of the Dangerous Drugs Ordinance. You have confirmed that plea today and you accept the summary of facts which have been read out in court. You stand convicted upon your own plea. I want to say at the outset that is to your credit that you pleaded guilty at the very first opportunity.

So far as the facts are concerned, in short, you were intercepted by the police on 26 January 2015 and you were found to have upon you 13.30 grammes of a white powder in a bag in your trouser pocket which contained 8.96 grammes of ketamine. And at the same time you were standing next to a motorbike, the keys of which were also found in your pockets, and a search of that bike recovered a further 34 plastic bags of dangerous drugs. All of those bags of dangerous drugs amounted to a weight of 188.20 grammes of ketamine of which 130.70 with the ketamine itself.

You made no response initially upon arrest and caution, but in interview you said you had no knowledge of the dangerous drugs and that the bike belonged to your brother-in-law. Although this was technically true, you were in fact the de facto owner of the bike and always had been. I am not going to hold that against you.

The drugs, as you know, were later confirmed to be ketamine and the retail value of what you had on you that day was $25,389.

By your plea now you accept that the drugs in your pocket were for your consumption and the 34 bags were for you to traffic in ketamine.

Mr Wong, you are now 51 years of age. You have a criminal record going back to when you were just 17 years old, but I do note, according to the criminal record, you have been out of trouble for the last 16 years. That too is to your credit. Within that criminal record, you have been dealt with for offences of dishonesty, violence and you have one similar matter to that for which you appear today. They are all a long while ago and I will not take them into account for the sentence that I am going to pass upon you.

Mr Boyton on your behalf has said that you are truly remorseful, and I can see that is the case from the very carefully worded letter which you have submitted to the court. He tells me that you are the sole carer of your children and you have also had responsibility for your aged mother. He also says that this offending would not have happened if it had not been for a series of matters which caused you some difficulty. You are divorced, raising the children on your own and, lastly, the loss of well-paid job which reduced your financial circumstances considerably.

These are serious offences. Mr Boyton is quite right that the sentencing exercise is not simply one, however, of a mathematical form of precision, and the whole circumstances of the offending should be taken into account. Yours, Mr Wong, is not an exceptional story. Many people suffer hardship and do not commit crimes, but I do believe that this has occurred out of character, and that as an adult you had turned your life around.

On Count 1, for 130.70 grammes of ketamine which you have admitted to trafficking in, under the guidelines set out in Secretary for Justice v Hii Siew Cheng [2009] 1 HKLRD 1, the starting point for sentence for trafficking in dangerous drugs between 50 to 300 grammes is 6 to 9 years. For 130.70 grammes, the starting point which I take today is 6 years and 6 months which, I believe, marks this court’s attitude to your early plea, remorse and to your personal circumstances. The sentence I pass therefore for Count 1 is 4 years and 4 months.

On Count 2, you admitted possession of 8.96 grammes of ketamine, and I take into account and into consideration the comments of Stock VP in HKSAR v Mok Cho Tik CACC 165/2000, and note that the sentencing range referred to there in these circumstances should be between 12 to 18 months even although the drugs in question today are ketamine. I should also factor in the latent risk that you may have gone on to traffic in those drugs as well given the circumstances in which they were found. So that on Count 2, I take a starting point of 12 months’ imprisonment, but I note that if you had pleaded guilty to trafficking in the whole amount of ketamine which was found on you that night, and that is 139.66 grammes, you would be looking at a similar starting point to the one which I have used for Count 1.

So on Count 1 you will go to prison for 4 years and 4 months, and on Count 2 you will go to prison for 8 months to run wholly concurrently with the sentence passed on you under Count 1, 4 years and 4 months in total.