Lee Yip Pan v. The Queen

CACC000156/1976

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Coram: Briggs, C.J., Huggins & Pickering, JJ.A.

Date of Judgment: 7th April 1976.

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JUDGMENT

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Pickering, J.A.:

1. The appellant was charged with murder. The learned trial judge having first satisfied himself most meticulously that this was a proper course to adopt, accepted a plea of not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter and, after hearing the facts, sentenced the appellant to five years' imprisonment. It is against that sentence that this appeal lies.

2. The appellant was 62. The woman he killed, 74. The two were neighbours and lived cheek by jowl in adjoining rooms in a resettlement estate, he with his son and she with her son, daughter-in-law and grandchildren. The first quarrel between the two families appears to have occurred in about March 1974 as a result of the unhygienic use to which the deceased's grandson put the gutter. Further incidents occurred largely in relation to the overflow of water from the gutter and the two families lived in an atmosphere of mutual frustration, aggravation and recrimination.

3. In July 1975 the deceased's daughter-in-law poured some dirty water into the gutter and, in so doing, spilt some of the water into the corridor outside the appellant's room. It was as she was attempting to clean the corridor floor with paper that the appellant returned to his home; a quarrel ensued during which the woman was joined by the deceased and, according to the appellant, one of the two women hit him with a bottle; it was at this stage that he rushed into his room and obtained a knife. In the ensuing struggle one stab wound was inflicted in the back of the deceased who died as a result of that.

4. The crime of manslaughter is one which embraces the widest area of culpability. At one extreme it is very close to murder, at the other a matter for probation. We think that this particular offence comes low upon the scale of culpability and that, having regard to the frustrations endured by the appellant, to the provocative attack made upon him, to his age and completely clear record and to the fact that no personal deterrence was required in a case of this sort, the sentence imposed was unnecessarily high.

5. We do not know how far it was apparent to the learned judge that the appellant is in ill-health but he so informed us and the truth of his remark was plain to see. For all these reasons the application for leave to appeal against sentence is allowed, the sentence of five years' imprisonment set aside and a sentence of three years' imprisonment substituted therefor.

Representation:

Appellant in person.

Graham, C.C., for respondent.