HKSAR v. Chu Kwok Hung

DCCC 125/2013

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

CRIMINAL CASE NO 125 OF 2013

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Reasons for Sentence

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1.The defendant pleaded guilty to a charge of trafficking in 11.59 grammes of ketamine.

2.At 4.18 pm on 2 November 2012, plainclothes police officers spotted the defendant acting furtively walking from a lift to Room 3502 on the 35th Floor of On Lai House in the On Tin Estate in Kwun Tong.

3.He was searched and in his trousers pocket the officers found a transparent resealable plastic bag containing nine smaller transparent resealable plastic bags containing the drugs the subject of the charge. 

4.He was arrested and cautioned and immediately admitted that some of the drugs were for his own consumption and some of them were for him to sell.  He told the police that he had purchased the drugs earlier that day for $1,000 at the Tsim Sha Tsui Star Ferry.  He intended to sell them for $100 per gramme. 

5.At the time of his arrest he was in possession of a mobile phone and $700 in cash. 

6.The street value of the drugs was just over $1,500.

7.The defendant has appeared before the court on six previous occasions in respect of eight offences.  His last court appearances was in 2011, when he was sentenced to 4 weeks’ imprisonment for resisting a police officer.  Only one of the previous convictions is drug-related.  In 2009 for possession of dangerous drugs he was ordered to go to a detention centre.

8.The defendant is 20 years of age and he is single.  He lives with his parents.  His father is aged 72 and his mother 50 and they are both retired.  He has elder sisters who are now working.  The defendant has worked previously as a kitchen worker and as a construction worker but was unemployed at the time of the offence. 

9.The main mitigation in this case is that the defendant frankly admitted the offence when he was arrested by the police and has pleaded guilty in court today.

10.Given the quantity of drugs involved and the defendant’s record, I take the view that only a custodial sentence would be appropriate in this case. 

11.The quantity of ketamine the defendant was found in possession of puts him in the sentencing category of 4 to 6 years, and given the quantity in this case, the appropriate sentence would be to the lower end of that sentencing scale.  I also take into account that some of the drugs were for his own consumption. 

12.I therefore propose to adopt a starting point of 3 years and 9 months’ imprisonment and reduce that by one-third to reflect the guilty plea.

13.The defendant will go to prison for 2 years and 6 months.