CRIMINAL CASE NO. 150 OF 2010
COURT: You are before this court to be sentenced having pleaded guilty before the Magistrates Court to two charges of trafficking in dangerous drugs, namely ketamine, charges 1 and 2 and to one charge of possession of a dangerous drug, namely nimetazepam, having been committed for sentence in respect of those matters.
The context of the charges are briefly as follows. You were seen by police officers to go into the flat referred to in the charges and when you came out after about half an hour you were stopped and searched and were found to be in possession of nine plastic bags containing 116.27 grammes of ketamine in a slightly larger mixture, which is charge 1.
You also had the keys to the flat which was searched and on a computer desk were two more bags of ketamine comprising 82.62 grammes of ketamine in a slightly larger mixture. In the kitchen were five bags containing .28 grammes of ketamine. The total in the flat was 82.9 grammes.
The police seized two sets of electronic scales which had traces of ketamine on them. They had obviously been used to weigh out the ketamine. Also seized were 44 empty plastic bags of different sizes. As well as the ketamine there was a foil pack containing 60 tablets which contained a total of .39 grammes of the drug nimetazepam.
So the total amount of ketamine which you were trafficking was 199.17 grammes. It is charged as charge 1, 116.27 grammes and charge 2, 82.9 grammes. Charge 3 relates to the offence of possession of the nimetazepam which is not charged as trafficking.
Upon your interception and arrest you said that you had been instructed by somebody to deliver the ketamine. The drugs had been supplied to you by that person along with the electronic scales and the empty plastic bags. You said that on the day of your arrest that person had instructed you to pack the ketamine into the nine small bags and to take them to somebody. The nimetazepam was for your personal consumption.
As you have been told, in order to achieve uniformity in sentencing for trafficking dangerous drugs, the Court of Appeal has laid down sentencing guidelines over the years for different types of dangerous drugs. In the case of ketamine the guidelines are to be found in a case called Hii Siew Cheng. Your case of just under 200 grammes falls into the bracket of trafficking in 50 to 300 grammes for which 6 to 9 years’ imprisonment is prescribed as the sentence for those convicted after trial, that is, before the appropriate discount for mitigation.
Although you were acting as a courier for the drugs found in your possession as you left the flat, you were also involved in the packaging of the drugs for distribution as you admitted, so you cannot be said to have been at the extreme lower end of the chain of distribution; you were higher up in that chain.
Now, the prosecution has chosen to split the ketamine trafficking into two charges, charges 1 and 2, involving the 116 grammes and 82 grammes. In my judgment however, this was one transaction of trafficking in dangerous drugs and therefore it is appropriate to look at the whole quantity to determine the appropriate sentence for trafficking in ketamine.
I have to determine where in the appropriate bracket of 6 to 9 years’ imprisonment for trafficking in quantities of 50 to 300 grammes this particular case falls. It is often said that sentencing in these drug trafficking cases is not a mathematical exercise. It certainly should not be so because that would be unfair to offenders like you who must be considered individually. Perhaps the very specific and apparently rigid brackets set out in guideline cases may make it look as though sentencing is based on calculation rather than judgment; but that is not the case.
In my judgment the appropriate sentence for trafficking in the total quantity of ketamine in this case before the discount for your mitigation should be 8 years’ imprisonment. I judge that in the circumstances, it is proper to apply that sentence to each of the two charges of trafficking in ketamine. Neither charge involves a very small quantity, and, of course, the sentences will run concurrently to achieve the proper overall sentence for the trafficking in charges 1 and 2.
Charge 3, the possession of a small quantity of nimetazepam has no significance in this case, and as I remarked during submissions, I do not need to call for a DATC report in the circumstances. The proper sentence before discount for your mitigation should be 9 months’ imprisonment.
Now, let me turn to the mitigation. You are a man in your mid twenties. You do not have a clear record but there is nothing in your record which aggravates the present offences. I have been told something of your personal circumstances, your employment and your family circumstances, to which I have regard but they can make no difference to the sentence that you must serve for these offences.
What does make a substantial difference to you is the fact of the pleas of guilty which you have entered in this case. That will lead to a discount of one-third on the sentence which would otherwise have been imposed. So it is a significant reduction in sentence.
Accordingly, the sentences I impose upon you are as follows. Charge 1, 5 years 4 months' imprisonment. Charge 2, 5 years 4 months' imprisonment to be served concurrently. Charge 3, 6 months' imprisonment to be served concurrently. The total sentence is therefore 5 years and 4 months' imprisonment.