COURT: The defendant has pleaded guilty to trafficking in dangerous drugs in the Magistrates’ Court and the particulars of the offence was that on 3 June 2022, he was found inside a room in the Nathan Hotel in Nathan Road and the drugs for which this charge encompasses is namely 221.31 grammes of a solid containing 64.54 grammes of cocaine, 19.90 grammes of a crystalline solid containing 19.49 grammes of methamphetamine hydrochloride, and 2.09 grammes of cannabis in herbal form.
Now, the facts which have been admitted was that police officers raided the guest room in the hotel at 12.47 am and inside the room was found the defendant and a female. Openly displayed in the room on the table was a digital scale, amongst other things, and a large quantity of transparent resealable plastic bags. In a wardrobe were found some of the drugs which is the subject matter of the charge and also some things were found on the bedside table.
The total drugs which were seized had an estimated street value of between $196,855 and $290,027.
The defendant was subsequently interviewed under caution and he admitted that he had lived in the room since March 2022 and he was the only person who had access to the room. He claimed that he bought the drugs from someone he did not know how to contact, and that the female that was found in his room did not know about the drugs.
Now, the defendant has a poor record in that he has committed similar offences in 1988 and also another drug offence in 2006, a possession of dangerous drugs offence and again in 2013. He has been, I can see from the record, he has been to the drug addiction treatment centre on, I think, about three occasions but it has not seemed to help him, because he claims that he has been addicted to cocaine for 10 years, he says.
As Ms Flora Cheng correctly pointed out, the only mitigating factor in this case is really his plea of guilty. However, as background, Ms Cheng had submitted that since his last conviction, he had attempted to stay away from any criminal activities and was a stage person, stage technician for a while. And then COVID happened and he suffered a drop in earnings and therefore he committed the present offence because he needed the money for his drug problem. So that is not mitigation at all but just a background.
Ms Cheng has also submitted, which I agree, that of all the sentencing approach, the best approach would be one of the combined approach. In this case, the drugs which were found, the large part is the cocaine. So I will take the basis for sentence as if all the drugs were cocaine. And the total would come to about 8 years 10 months or 11 months, as worked out by both counsel.
Now, the defendant has pleaded guilty. He is entitled to a one-third discount which I should give him. And so taking the overall sentence for this charge as 9 years’ starting point, I will reduce it by one-third and he is sentenced to 6 years’ imprisonment.