Attorney General v. Li Koon Lun

CAAR000027/1975

IN TEH SUPREME COURT OF HONG KONG

(APPELLATE JURISDICTION)

APPLICATION FOR REVIEW NO. 27 OF 1975

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Coram: Huggins, Pickering & Li, JJ.

Date of Judgment:1st December 1975.

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JUDGMENT

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Huggins, J.:

1. The Attorney General applied to the single judge under s.81A of the Criminal Procedure Ordinance for a review of sentences imposed by a magistrate. The learned Chief Justice refused leave as he considered that the case was not important enough to justify an application under this section. The application is now renewed before the Full Court.

2. The Respondent was charged on five charges which are related to some extent. The first charge was aiding and abetting the remaining in the Colony of two illegal immigrants. The other four charges related to corrupt soliciting and accepting of bribes from the relatives of the two illegal immigrants. The learned magistrate passed sentences of six months' imprisonment concurrent on each charge.

3. The Respondent was an auxiliary police officer. He was in fact making his living almost entirely from his police duties at the time. He was not employed in finding illegal immigrants or preventing their entry and at the time that the aided and abetted the offence on the first charge he was, apparently, not on duty, but he was living in the New Territories in the area where the two men were found. He assisted them to a place of safety and then searched out the relatives, from whom he demanded in the one case $700 and in the other case $500.

4. Perhaps it goes without saying that he was a man with no previous convictions. He was some 25 years of age. He had a family background which was not as happy as it might have been, but there is nothing very outstanding.

5. It is suggested that the sentences imposed were both wrong in principle and manifestly inadequate. It is suggested that they were wrong in principle because the aiding and abetting charge was separate and distinct from the others and because the four corrupt soliciting and accepting charges were properly divisible into two separate incidents - the soliciting and accepting from the relatives of one immigrant and the soliciting and accepting from the relatives of the other. After some deliberation we have come to the conclusion that it was not wrong to treat the charges as alleging substantially one course of conduct. It is true that they were to some extent separate but the aiding and abetting in this case was clearly with intent corruptly to solicit, and to accept (if possible), money and this is not the sort of case where the aiding and abetting was for humanitarian purposes and the soliciting and accepting completely independent and distinct. Therefore we think that the first limb of the argument in support of the application is ill-founded.

6. Then we are asked to say that the sentences are manifestly inadequate. We accept that the sentences might well have been heavier. Had there been sentences of twelve months' imprisonment they might well have been fully justified. One member of the Court might even have gone higher than that, but the test which has been adopted by this Court is that there should be a sense of shock resulting from the sentences imposed. We take into consideration that an immediate sentence of imprisonment was imposed: this was not, as have been some of the other cases, a case where a suspended sentence was imposed. The Respondent was sent immediately into prison and the only question is whether the length of the sentence was such that it causes a sense of shock. We have considered the matter very carefully and in our view this is not a suitable case for us to interfere.

7. The application, therefore, is dismissed.

1st December 1975.

Representation: