The facts which you have this morning confirmed are extremely straightforward and as your counsel has rightly said, all too familiar, they are basically that you arrived at Hong Kong International Airport on the day in question from Uganda via Doha, drugs were suspected to be concealed in your body cavity, as a result of which you were escorted to Queen Elizabeth Hospital where, over a period of time, you excreted a total of 110 pellets which contained the drugs which are the subject matter of this charge.
The drugs have a street value of HK$600,000 and you brought these drugs into Hong Kong for a reward of US$3,500.
Once again, your reasons for bringing these drugs into Hong Kong are all too familiar. You were in need of money and the reward that you were to obtain, I’m told, was to assist your younger sister and younger brother in their college education.
There is a clear aggravating feature in this case, that is the international element which exists by the very fact that these drugs were imported into Hong Kong by yourself.
Whilst I take into account everything that your counsel has very properly put before me by way of mitigation, the only real mitigation is your plea of guilty to this charge and I will give you full credit for that.
The sentencing guidelines for trafficking in large quantities of heroin and cocaine are the same and can be found in the case of HKSAR v Abdallah Anwar Abbas CA No 304 of 2008. The starting point for trafficking in between 600 to 1,200 grammes of narcotic falls between 20 to 23 years’ imprisonment after trial..
In this case this court is dealing with 830 grammes of narcotic being a mixture of cocaine and heroin.
I adopt as my starting point a sentence of 21 years’ imprisonment. I will enhance that sentence by 1 year to take account of the international element that I have identified, coming to 22 years’ imprisonment.
I discount that sentence by one-third to take account of your plea of guilty arriving at a sentence of 14 years and 8 months’ imprisonment.