THE QUEEN v. LEUNG YU-NAM

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JUDGMENT

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Ching JA (delivering the judgment of the Court):

1. The applicant was convicted of an offence of trafficking in dangerous drugs, being 85.04 grammes of a mixture containing 38.95 grammes of salts of esters of morphine on 21st August, 1994, outside No. 62A, Tai Hong Wai, Kam Tin, Pat Heung. He seeks leave to appeal against that conviction. He says that he has been trying to instruct a solicitor and seeks an adjournment but nothing that he has said to us persuades us to grant that adjournment.

2. The case was unusual in that no oral evidence at all was given. The applicant admitted the summary of facts and did not contest the admissibility of his cautioned statement. The facts proven by admission were therefore that at about 9.25 a.m. on 21st August, 1994, he was seen acting furtively and was stopped and searched. Six transparent plastic bags were found on him each containing 30 straws filled with the quantity and type of dangerous drugs set out in the charge. He admitted that they were such drugs and that they were his. He said that he is an addict and that he had purchased them from a man whose name he did not know at $180 per straw. He said that he had purchased them for his own consumption.

3. At the trial the applicant was willing to plead guilty to simple possession. The Judge below found, however, that as a matter of common sense and giving the benefit of the doubt to the applicant the drugs would have constituted a two months supply. On his own statement he was a hawker and the price he paid for the drugs was $14,400. The Judge below quite rightly held that the only inference that could be drawn was that the applicant was in possession for the purposes of trafficking.

4. The applicant alleges that he wished to call a witness who was not in the territory and had sought an adjournment. It appears that this witness was a Miss So. In his Reasons for Verdict the Judge below records that the Defence was given a four-day adjournment but on resumption it was said that the witness was in Taiwan and that the Defence did not propose to call her. No indication of any sort was ever given of the evidence that it was thought she might provide. In these circumstances it is quite impossible to say that the trial or the conviction was unsafe or unsatisfactory.

5. There is nothing in any of the grounds of appeal put forward and the application for leave is dismissed.