Chong Yeung Nam v. The Queen

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF HONG KONG

(APPELLATE JURISDICTION)

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 238 OF 1973

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JUDGMENT

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1.  The learned magistrate sentenced this Appellant to eighteen months’ imprisonment, six months’ imprisonment and six months’ imprisonment consecutive on three charges of burglary. The Statement of Findings records that after the charges had been read the Appellant was asked if he pleaded Guilty or Not Guilty and that he replied “I admit all three”. That was not a proper way to put the charges to the Appellants. They should have been put individually and a plea should have been taken on each charge individually. However, it is not suggested before me that the Appellant did not commit these offences.

2.  The circumstances of the offences were not ascertained in the court below but I am told – and the Appellant admits – that in respect of the first two charges he entered the premises through an open window and that in respect of the third charge he broke a window in order to obtain access to the premises.

3.  He had a previous conviction for burglary, for which he had been sentenced to eighteen months’ imprisonment, and had only recently been released from prison.  All that the Appellant can say to me is that in his opinion the sentences passed on him “were a bit too severe.”

4.  I cannot say that they were too severe and this appeal must be dismissed.

25th April 1973.