CRIMINAL CASE NO. 353 OF 2010
COURT: Lo Pun-fuk, you have pleaded guilty to trafficking in a very substantial quantity of dangerous drugs, 9,148.8 grammes of a powder containing 6,564.82 grammes of ketamine and 23.11 grammes of a solid containing 18.29 grammes of cocaine. The street value of the ketamine at that time was over $1 million and the cocaine over $22,000.
On 28 June last year, Customs officers followed a car driven and owned by you in which the former 1st defendant, Chan Kwong-chun, was a passenger in the front passenger seat. The Customs officers followed the car from a position outside Olympian City 2 in Mongkok where a third man had previously boarded the car for a while before leaving the car and taking a taxi.
After leaving Olympian City 2 it appears that you must have realised that your car was being followed because you frequently changed lanes and varied your speed. Ultimately, the car was stopped by congested traffic on the West Kowloon Corridor. Customs officers approached the car and found the drugs in a black bag in front of the front passenger seat.
When you were arrested and cautioned your response was to say that you thought the black bag possibly contained ketamine which Chan Kwong-chung had brought onto the car. You claimed that you did not know what the drugs would be used for. By your plea before this court you have accepted that you knew that the bag contained dangerous drugs and you were party to trafficking in them. You can have been in no doubt when you embarked upon this offence that very serious consequences would follow if you were caught.
If you had been trafficking in the cocaine alone, that would have warranted a starting point, in my view, of 5½ years’ imprisonment. The quantity of ketamine in this case is six‑and‑a‑half times the top of the tariff band laid down by the Court of Appeal in Secretary for Justice v Hii Siew Cheng in which the Court of Appeal said that the normal starting point for trafficking in between 600 to 1,000 grammes would be 12 to 14 years’ imprisonment.
There are no specific guidelines in respect of quantities of ketamine as large as that in this case, although there are such guidelines in respect of quantities of heroin and cocaine in quantities of this magnitude.
In considering the appropriate starting point if you had been trafficking in the ketamine alone, I have borne in mind the two recent cases of HKSAR v Chang Che Wei HCCC228/2010 and HKSAR v Suen Yung Yung & Another CACC509/2001 to which your counsel, Ms Chow, has helpfully referred me. In the latter case, on a charge involving 9.17 kilograms of ketamine the judge took a starting point of 18 years’ imprisonment.
Although I bear in mind that there cannot be a direct and precise mathematical relationship between sentences for heroin and cocaine and those involving ketamine, I have taken into account that the appropriate starting point, if the ketamine had been heroin or cocaine, would have been 27 years’ imprisonment. I have gone on to consider the relative sentencing guidelines for trafficking in different quantities of heroin and ketamine.
Insofar as ketamine is concerned, 600 grammes would be the top of the tariff band involving between 9 and 12 years’ imprisonment. 600 grammes of heroin would be the top of the tariff band of 15 to 20 years covering those who traffic in between 400 and 600 grammes of heroin. It appears, therefore, that at least insofar as quantities of narcotics weighing approximately 600 grammes are concerned, the starting point for sentence to be considered by the court for those who traffic in ketamine is approximately 60 per cent of that for those who traffic in heroin.
Taking into account the top of the tariff band involving up to 1 kilogram of ketamine, the cases to which Ms Chow has referred me and the comparison between the tariff for heroin and that for ketamine, I would have adopted a starting point of 16 years’ imprisonment if you had been trafficking in the ketamine alone. You were not. A lesser quantity, 18.29 grammes, but still valuable quantity of cocaine, was involved.
Taking that into account, I am satisfied that an appropriate overall starting point is 18 years’ imprisonment. I have disregarded your two relatively minor convictions committed some years ago. While I bear in mind that at least part of the reason you became involved in this case may have been to provide financial assistance for your sister and mother who were suffering in health, that is not a factor that, in my view, justifies any reduction in sentence in this case. The only substantial mitigation in this case justifying any reduction is your plea of guilty for which you are entitled to the usual discount of one-third.
I sentence you to 12 years’ imprisonment.