LO HON-SHAN v. THE QUEEN

CACC001292/1976

  

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL	1976 No. 1292
	(Criminal)

  

BETWEEN:
	LO Hon-shan	Appellant
	and
	THE QUEEN	Respondent

Coram: Briggs, C.J., Huggins & Pickering, JJ.A.

Date of Judgment: 23rd February, 1977.

  

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JUDGMENT

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1. The appellant pleaded guilty to one offence of robbery and was sentenced to four years' imprisonment.

2. On the 6th September, 1976, the appellant threatened a woman wheeling a child in a pram with a knife. She offered him $10. He refused this offer and insisted upon stealing two rings that she was wearing on her finger. He then ran away. Later, he was identified and made a statement admitting the offence.

3. As I have already said, he pleaded guilty to the offence before the District Court. He appeals against his sentence of four years.

4. The police record of previous convictions was placed before the court below and it shows that from November 1954 until May 1970 he had been tried and convicted on no less than 33 separate occasions. The convictions consist largely of minor offences but they do include several larcenies from the person and at least one offence in which violence was used. The record ends with an entry of the 21st May, 1970. This seems to show that the appellant has led a blameless existence so far as the law is concerned since that date. It is possible that there is in existence a record referring to convictions of the appellant after that date, but if such a record exists it was not placed before the District Court when that Court imposed a sentence of four years' imprisonment.

5. We think that we are bound by the record of the appellant as it was considered in the court below. We think that not sufficient attention was paid to the fact that there have been no recorded convictions since 1970.

6. The appellant is a married man with one daughter and at the time of the offence was in regular employment. In the event, we think that justice would best be done if we allow the appeal against sentence to the extent of reducing the period of four years to one of three years' imprisonment.

  

  

	(Geoffrey Briggs)
	President.

  

Representation:

Peter C.K. Chan (Thomas Wang & Co.) for appellant.

Evans for the Crown/respondent.