HKSAR v. Barros Correia Daniel Carlos

On 4 September 2026, the Court of Appeal (Macrae VP and Zervos JA) handed down judgment in HKSAR v Barros Correia Daniel Carlos (CACV 271/2025), allowing the appellant's appeal against sentence and reducing his term from 14 years to 12 years and 4 months' imprisonment. Mr David Boyton and Ms Gretel Wong, instructed by Lee Law Firm, acted for the successful appellant.

The appellant, then aged 24 with a clear record, pleaded guilty before a magistrate to trafficking in a dangerous drug, namely 910.40 grammes of solid containing 768.50 grammes of cocaine, contrary to section 4(1)(a) and (3) of the Dangerous Drugs Ordinance, Cap 134 (§1). He was committed to the High Court for sentence. On 27 October 2019, he arrived at Hong Kong International Airport from São Paulo via Addis Ababa. Customs officers found six packets of cocaine in his socks; he subsequently discharged a further 77 packets at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, making 83 in total with a retail value of HK$930,428 (§§2-3, 6). In interview, he said a person called "Leandro" had instructed him to swallow 100 pellets of cocaine in Brazil in exchange for 20,000 Brazilian Reals, and that he had vomited some pellets en route (§4).

On 23 December 2020, Toh J sentenced him to 14 years' imprisonment. Applying the Abdallah guidelines then in force, the judge took 20 years as the starting point for the 600-1,200 gramme band, added one year for the international element, and applied a one-third discount for the timely plea (§§8-9).

Holding

The Court held that the appellant, sentenced after the cut-off date in HKSAR v Lam Man Tak, remained within the appeal system and was entitled to the benefit of the revised guidelines in HKSAR v Huang Ruifang (No 3) (§12). Sentencing afresh, the appropriate notional sentence after trial was 18 years and 6 months' imprisonment, reflecting the quantity, the method of concealment, and his role as an international trafficker across three continents. With the one-third plea discount, the sentence became 12 years and 4 months' imprisonment (§§12-13).

For practitioners, the takeaway is the arithmetic under the revised framework: a starting point of 17 years for 768.50 grammes of cocaine, an enhancement of 12 to 18 months for the international element, and a one-third discount for an early plea produces a sentence in the 12-year range. Defendants sentenced under the old Abdallah guidelines who are still within the Lam Man Tak window should be reviewed for similar reductions.