HKSAR v. Ng Tak Ho

HCCC 56/2018

[2018] HKCFI 1189

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CRIMINAL CASE NO 56 OF 2018

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Transcript of the Audio Recording
of the Sentence in the above Case

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COURT:

Mr Ng, you pleaded guilty to one count of trafficking in dangerous drugs on 12 February of this year before the Eastern Magistrates Court, and have confirmed that plea once more today. The count to which you have pleaded guilty involves three different types of dangerous drugs, 1.10 grammes of cocaine, 23.33 grammes of ‘Ice’, and 1.74 grammes of ketamine. These were found upon you on 13 February 2017 by a police officer when you were seen to be acting suspiciously in the lobby of Choi Wah House, on the Choi Fai Estate in Wong Tai Sin.

The drugs were found in your trouser pocket; the cocaine was in a single plastic bag; the ‘Ice’ was found within three separate resealable plastic bags, as was the ketamine. Originally, you suggested that all of the drugs were for your own consumption and that you had recently purchased them for $3,500, but you had on you a further $2,529.30 in cash, four mobile phones and a tablet, two of which you suggested were for sale.

The actual street value of the drugs which you were found to be in possession of was $7,996. That is twice as much as you said that you had purchased the drugs for.

By reason of your plea today, you accept that you were in fact trafficking in those drugs. Mr Iu has not pursued the suggestion that part of those drugs were for self-consumption; that is a sensible approach given that you did not wish to provide evidence in support of that suggestion. I am not prepared to reduce the amount before me on that basis as I have no evidence from which I can arrive at an informed conclusion as to how much of it you may have consumed, especially as you had only recently left prison and no doubt had not been taking drugs for quite some period of time and would not therefore be dependent.

You are 27 years of age and you have a criminal record which dates back to 2003 when you were just 12 years old. Up to the age of 18, you had five appearances before the Magistrates’ Courts, and received probation, reformatory school, rehabilitation and DATC orders, none of which worked. You clearly had a troubled youth. You appeared in the District Court for the first time at the age of 19, which was for your first trafficking offence, and for which you received 2 years’ imprisonment in April 2010. Just one year later, in October 2011, you received another 2 years, 4 months’ imprisonment.

At the end of 2013, you were before the Magistrate’s Court for possession and a month later before the District Court again for trafficking. For that offence, you received 46 months’ imprisonment, consecutive to the 6 months you had received in the Magistrate’s Court in the previous month. You could not have been released for very long when you were before the courts again in September 2016 at the age of 25 for further possession, for which you received 10 months’ imprisonment. You were last released from prison on 3 January 2017 and you committed this offence on 13 February 2017.

I understand that your early problems would have led to you making friends with others who also led a life of crime. They must have been your support base during your early years and it is very difficult to disassociate yourself from that friendship base. You are still young, but your whole life appears to have revolved around crime and drugs. Mr Iu tells me that you now understand that you have to turn your life around. The sentences which you will face in the future are going to get longer and longer, and before you realise it, Mr Ng, your life will be gone. You need to stop because it will not be a sentence of imprisonment of 4 or 5 years of your life, but a sentence of 20 or 25 years, as you keep returning to your drug dealing habit to earn a living.

Drug dealers do not care if you go to prison for a long time. They do not care about you at all. You have to care about yourself, and life outside of prison is far better than life within it. The courts do not want to keep punishing you. The courts want you to have a full and honest life in the community. Do not deprive yourself of that.

I am pleased to hear that you have support in prison, not only from your family but also from the church, from Mr Wong and from Mr Tak. That support is essential if you are honestly going to try and mend your ways. Use the time you have inside the prison system to be drug free and to obtain qualifications so that you earn a living you are proud of. You now have the support system which will help you find employment and will support you when you are released and encourage you to avoid drugs and crime.

The charge you face involves three different types of drugs; cocaine, ‘Ice’ and ketamine. Cocaine falls to be considered under the guideline in HKSAR v Lau Tat Ming [1990] HKLR 370. For up to 10 grammes, the starting point after trial would be up to 5 years. For 1.10 grammes, the starting point would be just 6 months. ‘Ice’ falls to be dealt with under the guidelines in HKSAR v Tam Yi Chun [2014] 3 HKLRD 691. The starting point after trial for between 10 and 70 grammes of ‘Ice’ is between 7 and 11 years. For 20.33 grammes of ‘Ice’, the starting point would be 7 years, 8 months. Ketamine falls to be dealt with under the guidelines in HKSAR v Hii Siew Cheng [2009] 1 HKLRD 1. For between 1 and 10 grammes, the starting point after trial should be between 2 to 4 years. 1.74 grammes would therefore attract a starting point for sentence of 2 years.

Those individual sentences would make a total of 10 years and 2 months if they were considered together. That far exceeds the criminality of your offending. In this case, the amount of cocaine and ketamine was small. They represent just 4.74 per cent and 7.4 per cent of the total drugs recovered. If I took the total amount of the drugs, which is 23.17 grammes in weight, and sentenced you for all of it being ‘Ice’, the starting point after trial would be just 3 months greater, at 8 years and 1 month, and by that I mean 3 months greater than the starting point I have already indicated for the ‘Ice’ you were actually in possession of.

But it is not all ‘Ice’, is it? The ketamine is a less dangerous drug. Therefore, I consider that the appropriate starting point be 8 years, which adds just 4 months to your sentence for the cocaine and ketamine elements, and also including the element of latent risk. I am not going to aggravate that sentence further as a result of your criminal record. You have faced up to what you have done; you have not sought to blame others and you finally take responsibility for what you have made of your life to date. That is to your credit. You are entitled to a one-third discount for your early plea and you will go to prison for 5 years and 4 months.