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DCCC111/2011
IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE
HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION
CRIMINAL CASE NO. 111 OF 2011
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HKSAR |
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v. |
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Cheung Fu-shing |
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| Before: |
H H Judge Longley |
| Date: |
4 April 2011 at 9.41 am |
| Present: |
Miss Chan Sze-yan, PP of the Department of Justice, for HKSAR
Ms Cheng Siu-yu Eleanor, of K Y Lo & Co., assigned by the Director of Legal Aid, for the Defendant |
| Offence: |
Burglary (入屋犯法罪) |
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Reasons for Sentence
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1. Cheung Fu-shing, you have been convicted on your own plea of burglary at the premises of a mobile phone shop in Sheung Shui on the night of 4 to 5 December last year.
2. The mobile phone shop was adjacent to two amusement game centres. It was possible to gain access to the rear door of the mobile phone shop through one of the amusement game centres. On the night in question, you hid yourself behind a game machine in one of the amusement game centres as it was closing for business.
3. After the staff had left, you came out and then broke open the back door of the mobile phone shop. You then broke open a locked cabinet containing mobile phones and stole the mobile phones that are the subject of the charge.
4. Fortunately you were seen on the CCTV system by a member of staff of the second amusement games centre. She called the police who came and found you hiding in the first amusement games centre. You still had four mobile phones on you and the remaining five were found scattered around the amusement games centre. You admitted what you had done.
5. As you would have been well-aware, burglary is a serious offence. This was not an offence committed on thespur of the moment, but a calculated attempt to commit burglary at the mobile phone shop. You were prepared to break open the rear door and the cabinet in order to achieve your purpose.
6. Despite your young age, this is the fifth occasion you have come before the courts for an offence of dishonesty. Indeed, you were subject to a suspended sentence at the time you committed this offence.
7. If you had been an adult, I would have had no hesitation but to send you to prison. Since you are not an adult, I have had to consider alternative ways of dealing with you. It is for that reason that I called for the reports as to your suitability for detention and training centre. You are not considered suitable for detention centre but you are considered suitable for training centre.
8. It is apparent from looking at your record that the courts in the past have leant over backwards to try to give you a chance to come to your senses. At first you were not even prosecuted but given a Superintendent’s warning. Notwithstanding that, on two subsequent occasions the courts sentenced you to probation. They then sent you to a rehabilitation centre, and finally, you were given a suspended sentence.
9. You have failed to take advantage of the chances that have been given to you by the courts, although it does appear that for a while after you were discharged from rehabilitation centre you might have been making attempt to put your past behind you.
10. I am left with no alternative on this occasion but to order that you be detained in a training centre. I hope that on this occasion you take the opportunity when you are discharged to lead a law-abiding life. The alternative if you continue to re-offend is to waste your life in and out of prison. Do not be so foolish as to make that choice.
11. I make no order in respect of the suspended sentence, but make an order for detention in a training centre in respect of the burglary offence.
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P.K.M. Longley |
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District Court Judge |
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