The facts are all too common in Hong Kong in that the defendant is a Ugandan citizen who arrived in Hong Kong at the Hong Kong International Airport on a flight from Qatar. She was subsequently found to have concealed some foreign objects in her body.
Under caution she admitted that she had swallowed some pellets of drugs but she did not know what drugs they were and she had been promised US$2,000 as a reward. She subsequently discharged a total of 80 pellets of heroin. At the material time the heroin’s street value was about HK$878,000.
As with all these cases which have recently come before the court, the defendant has a clear record in Hong Kong. She is married and has children. I am told by Ms Crebbin who mitigated on her behalf that she committed this present offence because she wanted money in order to seek medical treatment for her young twin sons, aged 9. Her mother is also sick. So under those circumstances, not realising the implications of drug trafficking in Hong Kong, she agreed to do so.
Every case that comes before this court comes with very tragic stories. It is a sad fact that the constant repetition of the tragic individual circumstances sometimes immunises the court in a way that should not be the case. However, as the sentencing court in such a serious offence of drug trafficking, the Court of Appeal has said that the sentencing court has to follow certain guidelines in sentencing in order that there is consistency and also to indicate the severity and abhorrence that the local community view these drug trafficking cases.
Hong Kong being a cosmopolitan city is fighting a losing battle against these drug traffickers who use what we commonly call “mules” from the African countries and from the poorer countries to bring drugs into Hong Kong. The only thing that Hong Kong courts can do is to visit these couriers with severe sentences. Perhaps it is time for the embassies and consulates to act in their own countries to warn people about the severity of the imprisonment they face should they be caught trafficking in drugs into Hong Kong.
I have recently sentenced someone, a Columbian, and a movement has started in the Hong Kong prison amongst the Columbian detainees to write letters to the newspapers in Columbia to inform them about the situation in Hong Kong. Perhaps the defendant could think of doing that.
It has constantly exercised our minds as far as the Bench is concerned as to how to inform people coming into Hong Kong of the severity of the imprisonment that people face for carrying drugs into Hong Kong. One of the matters that perhaps the Department of Justice can look into is for the airlines to warn people when they are flying into Hong Kong about the type of sentences that Hong Kong courts mete out for drug trafficking and to provide, as some countries do, waste baskets in the arrivals halls for people to throw illicit things into that they are carrying.
It is a major problem and whilst I have every sympathy with what Ms Crebbin has said, as Ms Crebbin recognised, there is not very much I can do because if I should make an exception in the defendant’s case then it would be difficult, as far as other cases are concerned, so one has to follow and act accordingly within the guidelines.
I do accept the defendant is remorseful and that the defendant will be separated from her family for a long time. It is unfortunate that she has young children at home, but she was well aware of the fact that she has young children at home, a sickly mother and sickly children, before she decided to take the risk and come to Hong Kong with the drugs.
The guidelines as laid down in Lau Tak Ming for trafficking in heroin hydrochloride of between 400 to 600 grammes calls for a sentence of between 15 to 20 years. In this case the defendant has been found with 530 grammes of heroin calling for a sentence of about 17½ to 18 years as a starting point.
In this case, I will take the lesser of the starting point, which is 17½ years and give the defendant the full one-third discount which brings the sentence down to 11 years 4 months.
As far as the international element is concerned, bringing the drugs into Hong Kong, I consider that 1 year is a reasonable sentence for the aggravating feature. The 11 years 4 months plus 1 year for the aggravating factor brings the sentence to 12 years and 4 months.
The defendant is sentenced to 12 years and 4 months.