LO CHIN HUNG v. THE QUEEN
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CACC001091/1977
| IN THE COURT OF APPEAL | 1977 No.1091 |
| on appeal from the High Court | (Criminal) |
| BETWEEN: | ||
| LO Chin Hung | Appellant | |
| and | ||
| THE QUEEN | Respondent |
Coram: Briggs, C.J., Huggins & Pickering, JJ.A.
Date of Judgment: 7th December, 1977.
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JUDGMENT
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1. The appellant was found guilty of being in possession of dangerous drugs for the purpose of unlawful trafficking and he was sentenced to three and a half years' imprisonment. He appeals against both his conviction and sentence.
2. On the 27th June, 1977, as a result of an ambush a party of police officers apprehended the appellant and searched him. They found that he was in possession of 26 grammes of a mixture containing 9.1 grammes of heroin. The defence put up by the appellant in the court below was that the packet containing the dangerous drugs was picked up from the floor by a police officer and had not been taken out of his pocket when he was searched.
3. At the hearing of the appeal Mr. Nguyen, who appeared for the appellant, stated that he did not intend to proceed with the appeal against conviction and that appeal was dismissed.
4. In his reasons for sentence, the trial judge stated that he thought that the starting point from which to consider the sentence in this case was four years, and in the event, he imposed a sentence of three and a half years.
5. The appellant is a man of about 50 years old and has a young family. He has a previous conviction for a minor offence but the trial judge treated this case as being a first offence.
6. We do not think that four years was a proper "starting point" from which to consider the sentence in this case and we think that in case of a similar nature as this in which a relatively minor amount of drugs were found, the sentence of three and a half years was excessive.
7. In the event, we think that justice would best be done if that sentence was reduced from three and a half years' imprisonment to two and a half years' imprisonment, and we order accordingly.
| (Geoffrey Briggs) | |
| President. |
Representation:
Peter Nguyen (Sousae & Hoosen) for appellant.
Adams for the Crown/Respondent.