HKSAR v. CHAN WAI HUNG

DCCC 282/2013

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

CRIMINAL CASE NO 282 OF 2013

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REASONS FOR SENTENCE

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1.  The defendant, Chan Wai Hung (aged 42) (male), appeared before me and pleaded guilty to a single charge of wounding with intent, contrary to section 17(a) of the Offences against the Persons Ordinance, Cap 212.

2.  The particulars of offence avers that on 10 January this year, at Ground Floor, Fung Yu House, Sam Shing Estate, Tuen Mun, New Territories, the defendant unlawfully and maliciously wounded Lam Leung-yu with intent to do him grievous bodily harm.

Facts

3.  Mr Lam Leung-yu, the victim, is a 63-year-old caretaker working at Sam Shing Estate, Tuen Mun, New Territories.  On 10 January 2013, at about 8:06 pm, when the victim was working at the guard post at the ground floor of Fung Yu House, Sam Shing Estate, suddenly the defendant came out from the lift, jumped over the desk of the guard post and attacked the victim’s head from the front with a chopper without saying a single word.  The defendant continued to chop the victim for about three times before the victim was able to react.  The victim then used his bare hands to protect himself and tried to push the defendant away but the defendant kept chopping him.  Eventually, the victim was able to escape from the security post and went towards the main entrance of the Fung Yu House.  In the course of the escape, the victim used his left hand to protect his head but the defendant continued to chop his head, causing his left hand to sustain injuries.

4.  After the victim was able to open the metal gate of the Fung Yu House and ran out of the building, he continued to use both his arms to protect his head and kept shouting for help.  While he was running, the victim felt that his head was being chopped from behind for a number of times.  After a short while, he fell onto the ground. 

5.  Two passers-by, who were off-duty officers of Correctional Services Department, witnessed the defendant’s attack on the victim outside Fung Yu House.  These two passers-by then went towards the defendant, shouting him and asking him to stop but the defendant kept chasing and chopping the victim. Finally and fortunately, the defendant was subdued.  With the additional help of an unknown passer-by, the defendant was suppressed onto the ground and the case was reported to the police.

6.  There was profuse bleeding of the victim’s hands, arms and head, and a large part of his body was covered with blood, and the victim was then sent to the Tuen Mun Hospital for emergency treatment.

7.  After the defendant was arrested by the police, under caution, he claimed that when he was at home, he heard a voice asking him to chop the caretaker downstairs.  The chopper was seized.  It was a chopper with a blade about 18 cm.

8.  In a subsequent cautioned video-record interview conducted in the police station, the defendant further admitted that at the material time when he was watching news on the TV at home, he suddenly heard a man’s voice asking him to chop the caretaker downstairs.  He then lost control and picked up a chopper from the kitchen and put it in a backpack.  He then took the lift down to the lobby and approached the security post and jumped over the post and chopped the victim’s head for about 9 to 10 times.  The victim then shouted for help and ran away.

9.  The defendant said he then chased the victim and chopped his head twice from behind at the entrance of the building.  He continued to chase and chop the victim outside the building before the victim finally fell onto the ground.  Later, he was then subdued by two to three passers-by.

10.  In addition, he thought that he had chopped PW1 for 10 to 20 times, including his head and both his wrists.  During the attack, the defendant said he still heard the voice telling him to chop the victim to death.  He frankly admitted that if he had not been stopped by the others, he would have continued to chop the victim until he got fainted and fell onto the ground.  He said he had no grudge with the victim.

11.  The victim has suffered multiple injuries and laceration in his head and his left hand and emergency operations for repair of the laceration and fracture of the upper limbs were done in the hospital.  The injuries on the tendons and the digital nerves were repaired.  Multiple K‑wires were inserted to the left thumb, left index finger, left little finger and right middle finger.  The victim was later discharged on 19 January 2013.  The K-wires were removed on the following day, and thereafter he has started to undergo physiotherapy and occupational therapy treatment until now.

The Record of the defendant

12.  The defendant had in the past only one criminal record.  He was brought to the court in 1993 for multiple offences of “criminal damages”, “assaulting occasioning actual bodily harm”, “common assault” and “assaulting police officers”. For all these offences, he was sentenced by the Magistrate Court to the Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre for 6 months under section 45 of the Mental Health Ordinance. 

13.  According to the psychiatric report, the defendant had known history of psychiatric problem.  He was known to the mental health service already in the 1990s and he was suffering all along with schizophrenia with multiple psychiatric admissions.  He was last admitted to the Castle Peak Hospital from April 2011 to December 2011 for referential and persecutory delusions.  He resided in a halfway house with regular follow-up in Tuen Mun Mental Health Centre.

14.  According to the examination and the recommendation of the two psychiatrists, clearly, the defendant has suffered from paranoid schizophrenia. According to their opinion, the defendant was becoming stable in the Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre after the current remand.  Both psychiatrists were of the opinion that in-patient psychiatric treatment would be recommended for the sake of the safety of the public as well as for the defendant.  Both psychiatrists recommended to the court a hospital order under section 45 of the Mental Health Ordinance for nine months.  

15.  It is important to note that both psychiatrists said that the defendant could serve his hospital order at the Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre, and they also added that further treatment in a mental hospital could be arranged upon the expiry of the hospital order. 

16.  No doubt it is so clear to the court that the defendant is suffering from schizophrenia at the time of the offence.  He bore no grudge with the victim and this attack is clearly lack of any motive.  At the time of the offence, the defendant clearly was suffering from the onset of his hallucination.  It is only fortunate that the victim was not chopped to death because of the intervention of the passers-by.

17.  The court is of course very concerned with the psychiatric condition of the defendant.  I have also warned the defendant myself that he should fully comply with the medications and the instructions of the medical officers and that if he has developed into any hallucination and delusion again, he should at once seek help from the psychiatric centre.

18.  In the end, the court would follow the recommendation by the two psychiatrists in the reports, and it is hoped that after receiving proper treatment, the defendant can fully recover after spending time there.  The defendant should also know that further treatment in the mental hospital is still not ruled out.  It does not mean that after nine months, he could be set free.  The defendant has to help himself by fully co-operating in the treatment.  In the end, it is after all for the sake of his own well-being as well as the safety of the public.  He should also know that attack of this kind could not be tolerated, and if he continues to commit offences like this, it is anticipated that he would indefinitely be detained in the psychiatric centre.