HKSAR v. LAU CHEUNG CHING

CACC 431/2002

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 431 OF 2002

(ON APPEAL FROM DCCC NO. 308 of 2002)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon Stock JA (giving the judgment of the Court):

1 This applicant comes to this Court for leave to appeal against sentence, leave having been refused by the single judge on 12 December 2002. The applicant pleaded guilty in the District Court before Deputy Judge Andrew Chan on 8 August 2002 to two charges: a burglary in 1996, and remaining in Hong Kong unlawfully, the latter offence in February 2002.

2 The burglary was of domestic premises. There were no occupants in the premises at the time. The judge took a starting point of three years' imprisonment for the burglary, and sentenced the applicant to a term of two years' imprisonment for that offence. For the immigration offence, he was sentenced to fifteen months' imprisonment, and that term was ordered to run consecutively; a total, therefore, of three years and three months' imprisonment.

3 In his original grounds of appeal, the applicant complained about not being charged in 1996 for the burglary and, further that the judge did not accept any of his mitigation. In recent home-made grounds of appeal, he says that when on the Mainland he suffered from psychiatric illness and that he sneaked into Hong Kong in 1996 because he had lost his job, and that he then earned money, which he used when he returned to the Mainland to spend upon treatment. He sneaked in again in February 2002 to earn more money; again, he says, to pay for treatment on the Mainland. There is no evidence to support that suggestion. Indeed, we have a report from the Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre where he has been examined, from whom the diagnosis is of a mild anxiety neurosis, but no more. There is no psychosis, and no treatment is required.

4 There is nothing in these grounds, nor any cause for us to suggest that the sentences were either wrong in principle or manifestly excessive. Accordingly, the application for leave to appeal against sentence is dismissed.