Read the full judgment text of CACC 000456/1996 on BabelCite. This Court of Appeal judgment was delivered on 28 January 2004.
1. This is an application to treat an abandonment of an appeal as a nullity. The applicant was sentenced on 2 July 1996 by Deputy Judge Jackson (as he then was) to a term of 12 years imprisonment for trafficking in dangerous drugs. He had been caught at the departure lounge of Hong Kong airport with two packets of heroin, the narcotic content of which was 597 grams. The judge would have been justified in taking a starting point of 20 years imprisonment but took a lower point of 18 years because