COURT: This is my sentence and my reasons for sentence.
The defendant, a 47-year-old Filipino, pleaded guilty before me to an offence of trafficking in 47.08 grammes of methamphetamine hydrochloride, “Ice”.
The defendant was intercepted on 13 September last year by a police team as he was about to enter his premises in a building at Sai Ying Pun.
Inside the premises, the defendant was searched and was found to be carrying nine small plastic bags of drugs. Inside a safe in the bedroom of the premises were found two more plastic bags containing drugs, and a sum of $200,000 cash.
Subsequently, under caution, the defendant admitted he possessed those drugs, and before me he admitted he possessed the greater part of the drugs for the purpose of trafficking.
In that regard, Mr Mughal submitted that regardless of the defendant’s plea to the charge, the nine small bags of narcotic found on the person of the defendant after he was intercepted by police as he was entering his premises were for the defendant’s self use.
Those packets contained 2.28 grammes of the total of 47.08 grammes of the narcotic content of the drugs the subject of the charge.
Mr Melwaney, for the prosecution, does not oppose the submission that the 2.28 grammes of “Ice” found in the nine packets were for self use.
I am a little concerned that no apparatus for consumption was found in the premises. Nevertheless, given the fact that the 2.28 grammes of “Ice” were packaged for consumption and were being brought into the premises, I will give the defendant the benefit of the doubt in this regard.
But, in my view, even accepting, as I do, that that part of the drugs may well have been intended for self-consumption by the defendant, the latent risk of them becoming part of the drugs trafficked by him was very high indeed.
He was found bringing them into the small flat where he stored the drugs which were intended to be trafficked by him. His girlfriend was apparently a co-resident of the premises, and the defendant was, at the time, a drug trafficker.
It seems to me that there must almost always be a very considerable risk of any drugs possessed by a drug trafficker being in some way eventually trafficked. It will, of course, depend on the circumstances of each case.
But the circumstances of this case point to that risk being very high indeed.
Accordingly, the reduction in starting point from that which would otherwise apply in this case must be very minor.
I take a starting point, therefore, of 8 years 4 months’ imprisonment which is 2 months less than that which would otherwise have been applicable had the whole quantity of drugs found been possessed for the purposes of trafficking.
Mr Mughal, in mitigation, has advanced a number of other matters, and given the defendant’s plea of guilty, I accept that a significant reduction in the defendant’s sentence is called for.
Accordingly, I reduce the starting point of sentence to a sentence of five years’ imprisonment.