HKSAR v. L. S. T.

On 5 August 2026, D'Almada Remedios J handed down reasons for sentence in HKSAR v. L.S.T., HCCC 318/2024, [2026] HKCFI 4451, sentencing the defendant to 22 years' imprisonment for the manslaughter by gross negligence and cruelty of her five-year-old son Z. Mr Ng Wing-kit, SPP, appeared for the prosecution; Mr David Boyton (instructed by King & Co., assigned by DLA) acted for the defendant.

The defendant pleaded guilty on 30 September 2024 at Eastern Magistracy and was committed to the Court of First Instance for sentence. Charge 1 alleged manslaughter by gross negligence (common law, s.7 Cap. 212); Charge 2 alleged cruelty to a child (s.27(1) Cap. 212).

Z was born in April 2017 with neonatal drug withdrawal and spent 57 days in hospital before going into foster care. At nine months he suffered shaken baby syndrome and was placed in a Children's Residential Home with global developmental delay. After the defendant completed drug rehabilitation in late 2019, social workers approved a phased restoration of her three children, completed by April 2022. Collateral visits between August 2020 and mid-2022 found no irregularities (§§9-28).

Once home, the defendant singled Z out. She isolated him in a bedroom, tied his limbs to restrain him, beat him with a cane or hanger, and concealed his deterioration from teachers and social workers. Z attended nursery on only 38 of 126 days in 2020-21 and 36 of 141 days in 2021-22, and not at all after January 2022. By his death on 3 September 2022, Z weighed 9.7 kg (well below the 3rd centile) and bore 129 external injuries. The pathologist concluded the cause of death was severe malnutrition from starvation and neglect, with an estimated caloric deficit equivalent to 61-91 days without food (§§45-48).

The Court held that:

(1) The objective gravity fell within the worst category of gross negligence manslaughter. The deliberate, prolonged starvation combined with concealment, isolation, and physical abuse reflected a 'savage nature utterly devoid of the empathy inherent to motherhood' (§§86, 88, 102).

(2) The aggravating features mirrored those identified by Zervos JA in HKSAR v Wong Wing Man, Mandy [2020] HKCA 534: targeting one child, isolation, deliberate concealment from authorities, failure to seek medical help, and abuse of the position of trust as mother (§§98-100).

(3) The guilty plea carried little weight given the catastrophic suffering inflicted (§101).

The court adopted a starting point of 30 years for manslaughter and 9 years 6 months for cruelty to a child, applying a one-third discount for the earliest guilty plea. Two years of Charge 2 were ordered consecutive to Charge 1, giving a total of 22 years' imprisonment (§§104-108).

For practitioners, deliberate starvation of a child to death, combined with concealment from authorities, now attracts a starting point well above the 12-year benchmark in Lam Wai Man [1999] 3 HKLRD 855. Targeting one child, isolation, and concealment are independently aggravating features warranting a partly consecutive sentence.