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Criminal Appeal2002

HKSAR v. LAM YUET SIU

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4038-EN-2004-01-08

HKSAR v. LAM YUET SIU

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CACC000411B/2002

CACC 411/2002

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 411 OF 2002

(ON APPEAL FROM DCCC NO. 233 OF 2002)

----------------------

BETWEEN
HKSARRespondent
AND
LAM YUET SIU 林悅笑Applicant

______________

Coram: Hon Stuart-Moore V-P, Stock JA and Lunn J in Court

Date of Hearing: 8 January 2004

Date of Judgment: 8 January 2004

----------------------

J U D G M E N T

----------------------

Hon Stock JA (giving the judgment of the Court):

1. On 6 August 2002 this applicant was convicted by HH Judge Chua in the District Court of five charges - three of theft of choses in action and two of dealing with property which she knew to be the proceeds of an indictable offence. She was sentenced to a total term of three years and five months' imprisonment. On 19 August 2002 she launched an application for leave to appeal against conviction and sentence. Those applications came before this Court, slightly differently constituted, on 16 May 2003. On that date the applicant, who had earlier been refused leave by the single judge, abandoned her application for leave to appeal against conviction and accordingly that application was dismissed by the court. The court then determined the issue of sentence in her favour in that it set aside a purported amendment by the judge below of the order originally made as to the manner in which a term of three years and five months' imprisonment was to run in relation to an earlier sentence which the applicant was already serving. The details of this Court's determination is to be found in the Reasons handed down on 29 May 2003.

2. By an Affirmation dated 30 May 2003 the applicant seeks to renew her application for leave to appeal against conviction. She asks in other words that the court should treat her abandonment as a nullity. She says now that she was only served with the respondent's submissions two days before the hearing on 16 May and was not aware what she could do about it, and she says that when she said in court on 16 May that she wanted to abandon her application she made a mistake. She tells us today that she has been advised by friends and others that she has grounds to appeal against conviction.

3. We are entirely satisfied that when the applicant abandoned her application she knew full well what she was doing. No complaint was made by her to the court on 16 May about late service of arguments, and as the record shows she is no stranger to the courts nor, as the voluminous papers amply show, is she at all reluctant to raise and press matters which are even remotely perceived by her as being possibly in her interest to pursue. She has not begun to show that in the act of abandonment her mind did not go with her deed; and therefore she has failed to demonstrate that the abandonment was a nullity. Her application is therefore refused.

(M. Stuart-Moore)(Frank Stock)(Michael Lunn)
Vice-PresidentJustice of AppealJudge of the
Court of First Instance

Representation:

Applicant in person

Mr K P Zervos, SC, SADPP of the Department of Justice for the Respondent

4037-EN-2003-05-16

HKSAR v. LAM YUET SIU

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CACC000411A/2002

CACC411/2002

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 411 OF 2002

(ON APPEAL FROM DCCC NO. 233 OF 2002)

--------------

BETWEEN
HKSARRespondent
AND
LAM YUET SIUApplicant

--------------

Coram: Hon Stuart-Moore VP, Stock JA and Jackson J in Court

Date of Hearing: 16 May 2003

Date of Judgment: 16 May 2003

Date of Handing Down Reasons for Judgment : 29 May 2003

----------------------

J U D G M E N T

----------------------

Jackson J (giving the judgment of the Court) :

Introduction

1. On 6 August 2002 in the District Court the applicant (who was the 2nd defendant at trial) and another defendant (the 1st defendant) were convicted after trial before Her Honour Judge Chua of the following offences :

" 1st Charge (against D1 and the applicant)

Statement of Offence

Theft, contrary to section 9 of the Theft Ordinance, Cap. 210.

Particulars of Offence

WONG Kit-ling and LAM Yuet-siu Allian SALIM, on or about the 18th day of July 2001, in Hong Kong, stole a chose in action, namely a debt in the sum of $1,500,000.00 Hong Kong currency owed by DBS Kwong On Bank Limited to LAW Tiang-kie, the property of LAW Tiang-kie.

2nd Charge (against D1 and the applicant)

Statement of Offence

Theft, contrary to section 9 of the Theft Ordinance, Cap. 210.

Particulars of Offence

WONG Kit-ling and LAM Yuet-siu Allian SALIM, on or about the 16th day of August 2001, in Hong Kong, stole a chose in action, namely a debt in the sum of $2,000,000.00 Hong Kong currency owed by DBS Kwong On Bank Limited to LAW Tiang-Kie, the property of LAW Tiang-kie.

3rd Charge (against D1 only)

Statement of Offence

Theft, contrary to section 9 of the Theft Ordinance, Cap. 210.

Particulars of Offence

WONG Kit-ling, on or about the 8th day of December 2000, in Hong Kong, stole a chose in action, namely a debt in the sum of $566,257.68 Hong Kong currency owed by DBS Kwong On Bank Limited to LAM Lai-wa and LEUNG Chi-wai, the property of LAM Lai-wa and LEUNG Chi-wai.

4th Charge (against the applicant only)

Statement of Offence

Dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of an indictable offence, contrary to section 25(1) and (3) of the Organized and Serious Crimes Ordinance, Cap. 455.

Particulars of Offence

LAM Yuet-siu alias Allina SALIM, on or about the 18th day of July 2000, in Hong Kong, knowing or having reasonable grounds to believe that property, namely the sum of $1,158,000.00 Hong Kong currency, in whole or in part directly or indirectly represented the proceeds of an indictable offence, namely, theft, dealt with the said property.

5th Charge (against the applicant only)

Statement of Offence

Dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of an indictable offence, contrary to section 25(1) and (3) of the Organized and Serious Crimes Ordinance, Cap. 455.

Particulars of Offence

LAM Yuet-siu alias Allina SALIM, on or about the 15th day of August 2001 and the 31st day of August 2001, both dates inclusive, in Hong Kong, knowing or having reasonable grounds to believe that property, namely the sum of $2,000,000.00 Hong Kong currency, in whole or in part directly or indirectly represented the proceeds of an indictable offence, namely, theft, dealt with the said property."

2. In short then the 1st defendant was convicted of three offences of theft and the applicant was convicted of two offences of theft and two offences of dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of an indictable offence. The 1st defendant was sentenced to two years' imprisonment in respect of the 1st charge and to three years and two months' imprisonment in respect of both the 2nd and 3rd charges, such terms to be served concurrently. The applicant was sentenced to three years and five months' imprisonment in respect of each of the 1st, 2nd, 4th and 5th charges, those sentences to be served concurrently as between themselves but the judge ultimately - as to which we shall shortly return - ordered or purported to order that those sentences were to run consecutively to a term of one year and nine months which she was then serving and which was imposed on 23 February 2002.

3. On 11 March 2003 both the 1st defendant and the applicant applied for leave to appeal against both conviction and sentence before Leong CJHC. Their applications were dismissed. Both the 1st defendant and the applicant then sought leave before us to renew their applications for leave to appeal against both conviction and sentence. The 1st defendant abandoned both of her applications by notice dated 10 May 2003. When the applicant came before us on 16 May she abandoned her application in relation to conviction but pursued her application in relation to sentence.

4. On 16 May we dismissed the application in relation to conviction and we gave leave to the applicant to renew her application in relation to sentence. We treated the hearing of that application as the hearing of the appeal allowed the appeal and ordered that she serve three years and five months' imprisonment in respect of each of the offences of which she had been found guilty such sentences to be served concurrently as between themselves and to take effect from 6 September 2002. So that there is no doubt about it the sentence of three years and five months' imprisonment is to commence one month after its imposition on 6 August 2002 and otherwise concurrently with the balance of the sentence imposed on 23 February 2002.

5. Our reasons follow.

The prosecution's case at trial

6.(a) The 1st defendant was at the material time a customer service officer/cashier of DBS Kwong On Bank Limited Yaumatei Branch whose duties included handling time deposit accounts and giving endorsement where subordinate tellers were dealing with large withdrawals. The applicant was a client of the bank who in March 2001 paid a deposit of $30,000 on signing a provisional agreement for the purchase of a flat at the price of $11,880,000. This cheque was dishonoured. The applicant subsequently paid the $30,000 in cash. The principal deposit of $1,158,000 was not paid on the due date and when the applicant presented a cheque for that sum on 11 July 2001 it too was dishonoured;

(b) on 5 September 2001, a customer of the bank ("the customer") received a bank statement relating to his account for August 2001;

(c) to his consternation he noticed a withdrawal of HK$2 million dated 16 August 2001 (Charge 2) and an overdraft balance brought forward of HK$1,483,366.82 from the previous month. He had not withdrawn the $2 million; nor had he used any overdraft facility that year. His account had been in credit;

(d) not surprisingly the customer went to the bank to lodge a complaint. He was accompanied by his wife and they were seen by the Branch Manager and the Marketing Manager. Since the customer had not received a bank statement for July 2001, he was given a copy. On that statement he saw another unauthorized withdrawal of HK$1.5 million dated 18 July 2001 (Charge 1);

(e) the Bank's journal for 18 July 2001 indicated that a cash withdrawal of HK$1.5 million had been made from the customer's account and, from that sum, a cash deposit of HK$1,158,000 was paid into an account of the solicitors' firm which firm was acting in the applicant's property purchase. The journals for 15-16 August 2001 indicated a memo withdrawal of HK$2 million from the customer's account and a memo deposit of the same sum into an account of a 'J's Company' owned by the applicant and from which the applicant made 12 withdrawals;

(f) with respect to the first incident in time a bank teller said that the 1st defendant, who was her supervisor, approached her on 18 July 2001 with one withdrawal slip and one deposit slip, saying she wanted to do a transfer in the teller's computer terminal and she proceeded to do so;

(g) with regard to the second incident in time another bank teller was able to identify from the journal record of 15 August 2001 that she had effected the memo transfer of HK$2 million to the applicant's J's Company's account; and

(h) audio telephone recordings from the bank revealed conversations between the 1st defendant and the applicant between 14 and 20 August 2001. In one such the applicant was pressing the 1st defendant to deposit HK$2 million into the applicant's J Company account. In others the applicant repeatedly reassured the 1st defendant that she was expecting a remittance of HK$18 million to be made into her account and that both of them would be "alright". That remittance did not materialize.

7. In her initial 'home-made' grounds of appeal relating to sentence, the applicant complained that the sentence imposed upon her was manifestly excessive and further that the judge "suddenly amended the sentence without proper procedure".

8. The second of these grounds was unusual to say the least. In January 2003, when this matter came before another single judge for leave, he was in possession of a transcript of the hearing of 12 August and Reasons for Sentence which referred to 6 August. Alerted by the applicant's complaint and by the District Court clerk's note of the order made on 6 August, he ordered a transcript of the hearing of 6 August.

9. What the judge said in sentencing the applicant on 6 August 2002 was this :

" ... As for D2, she has a previous record, all three involving dishonesty. In 1993 she was incarcerated under a Hospital Order for a year. She is presently appealing a 21 month sentence imposed at the end of February this year for procuring a valuable security, an offence similar to the ones in 1993.

She is sentenced to 3 years and 5 months on charges 1, 2, 4 and 5. These sentences are to run concurrently with each other and consecutive to the sentence she is presently serving by 1 month." [emphasis added]

10. Plainly the sentence imposed on 6 August was in principle inappropriate since the present offences were committed whilst on bail for the earlier offences. No doubt the judge, after 6 August, came to the same view. However somewhat to our surprise we note that on 12 August the applicant was brought back before the judge but, so far as we can ascertain, no representative of the prosecution was invited to attend that hearing. The following exchange took place between the judge and the applicant who continued to be unrepresented :

"COURT: Yes, Miss Lam, the reason you are brought here is I made a mistake last time. Your sentence is consecutive to the sentence you are serving. It's not a month extra.

2ND DEFENDANT: I see.

COURT: All right?

2ND DEFENDANT: Yes.

COURT: So that's what you'll get.

2ND DEFENDANT: It's two combined together to do it or what?

COURT: No, no. It's not concurrent, it's consecutive. You finish your present sentence, then you start your new sentence.

2ND DEFENDANT: Your Honour, I thought it's wrongly doing this together.

COURT: No, no. You've got a new sentence because you have committed new offences.

2ND DEFENDANT: Yes.

COURT: So that sentence...

2ND DEFENDANT: Separate.

COURT: ... is separate from the one you are currently serving.

2ND DEFENDANT: I see.

COURT: But what I said was that it will start a month after which means it would have been longer by a month so it was a slip of my tongue. So I've called you back to say your new sentence for the new offences will start after you finish whatever you're serving now."

11. A number of questions arise from this state of affairs not least of which is what did the judge intend by the sentence she imposed on 6 August? Further we have had to ask ourselves whether the judge had jurisdiction to alter or to amend that sentence on 12 August and, even if so, what was the practical effect of such alteration or amendment, and was the course adopted by the judge unjust?

12. The answers to those questions seem to us to be as follows :

(a) the judge in her sentence imposed on 6 August can only have meant that the applicant was to serve concurrent sentences of three years and five months' imprisonment which sentences were to commence one month later (i.e. on 6 September). [See section 68 of the Criminal Procedure Ordinance, Cap.221]. Any other view of what she said would appear to be a nonsense and we fail to see how this can be categorised (as the judge sought to categorise it, and as did counsel for the respondent before us), as a 'slip of the tongue'; and

(b) it is unnecessary to determine whether the judge had jurisdiction to vary the sentence as she purported to do on 12 August, although we doubt that she had. We were not addressed on the question of jurisdiction. It suffices for present purposes to say that to bring this unrepresented applicant back 6 days after the event and effectively increase the sentence imposed by 15 months gave to her a justified sense of grievance. The course adopted by the judge on 12 August was plainly unjust, and wrong in principle.

13. In the event we made enquiry directly of the applicant who, hardly surprisingly being somewhat confused by the effect of what had happened on 6 and 12 August 2002, indicated her concern as to which sentences were concurrent and which were consecutive.

14. She was apparently content - and perhaps not surprisingly in the light of the events which had taken place to be told by us that we were considering the making of the order which we did make, i.e. the order confirming the sentence which we felt had plainly been intended (despite the apparent ambiguities in her language) by the judge on 6 August. In a sense the applicant is fortunate in that the order which the judge ought to have made on 6 August, but did not, is the one which she made on 12 August.

15. In short, therefore we ordered that the original sentence of the judge should stand.

(M. Stuart-Moore)(F. Stock)(C.G. Jackson)
Vice-PresidentJustice of AppealJudge of the Court of
First Instance

Representation:

Mr. Jonathan Man, SGC of the Department of Justice for the Respondent

LAM Yuet-siu, Applicant in Person

4039-EN-2003-03-11

HKSAR v. WONG KIT LING AND ANOTHER

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CACC000411/2002

CACC411/2002

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 411 OF 2002

(ON APPEAL FROM DCCC NO. 233 OF 2002)

_________________________

BETWEEN
HKSARRespondent
AND
WONG KIT LING1st Applicant
LAM YUEN SIU2nd Applicant

_________________________

Coram: Hon Leong CJHC in Court

Date of Hearing: 11 March 2003

Date of Judgment: 11 March 2003

_______________

J U D G M E N T

_______________

1. The 1st applicant Wong Kit Ling and the 2nd applicant Lam Yuet Siu were jointly charged with two counts of theft (the 1st and 2nd charge), involving $1.5 million and $2 million respectively.

2. The 1st applicant was also charged with a third count of theft involving some $566,257.

3. The 2nd applicant was also charged with two counts of dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of theft (the 4th and 5th charge). These charges concerned the amounts in the 1st and 2nd charge of theft.

4. The two applicants were convicted after trial in the District Court of all the charges against them.

5. The 1st applicant was sentenced to 2 years imprisonment on the 1st charge, 3 years and 2 months each on the 2nd and 3rd charge, all sentences to run concurrently, making a total of 3 years and 2 months imprisonment.

6. The 2nd applicant was sentenced to 3 years and 5 months on each of the 1st, 2nd, 4th and 5th charge, concurrent making a total of 3 years and 5 months imprisonment, but consecutive to the 21 months imprisonment the 2nd applicant was then serving.

7. Both applicants apply for leave to appeal against conviction and sentence.

8. The 1st applicant's grounds of appeal against conviction are :

(1) the conviction was not supported by adequate evidence;

(2) the judge did not consider the evidence of the witnesses; and

(3) the judge relied on evidence which is untrue.

9. Her ground of appeal against sentence is the sentence was too long.

10. In her grounds put before me today she reverts to the evidence of the witnesses and the documents before the trial court and states that the evidence should not be accepted by the court. As regards sentence, she asks the court to reduce her sentence in order that she may be with her children and asks the court to take into consideration that she had lost her career, she had no benefit personally and that her husband is now filing bankruptcy petition.

11. The 2nd applicant's ground of appeal against conviction is that there are doubts in the evidence and the trial judge did not give her the benefit of the doubt. She also states that there was a mistake after the judge had handed down the sentence, the judge amended the sentence without following proper procedure.

12. The 1st applicant was a customer service officer of the DBS Kwong On Bank, Yaumati Branch (the Bank). She was custodian of the vault and was responsible, inter alia, for receiving cash from tellers at the close of business, handling time deposit accounts and authorizing tellers to deal with transactions which are larger than the teller's limit. For the latter purpose, she possessed an overriding card to permit the computer to process such over the limit transactions.

13. The 2nd applicant was a friend of the 1st applicant. She maintained with the Bank a personal account and company accounts of her two companies: J's Company and Kim Youth Far East Trading Company.

14. In March 2001, the 2nd applicant paid a deposit of $30,000 on signing a provisional agreement for the purchase of a flat in Tsimshatsui. The purchase price was $11,880,000. This cheque of $30,000 was dishonoured. She subsequently paid the amount in cash. The main deposit of $1,158,000 was not paid on the due date. The completion date was subsequently postponed to 20.8.2001.

15. On 11.7.2001, the 2nd applicant's cheque of $1,158,000 in payment of the main deposit was dishonoured. Be that as it may, the transaction proceeded to completion on 20.8.2001 after the deadline was extended from 5 pm that day to 5.30 pm. But two cheques drawn on the account of the solicitors for the seller WC Lee and the 2nd applicant's cheque in payment of commission were dishonoured.

16. The prosecution evidence on the 1st, 2nd ,4th and 5th charge was this: PW1 maintained an account with the Bank. His wife found out from the July 2001 statement that $1.5 million had been withdrawn from the account on 18.7.2001 without PW1's authority. She queried the Bank. The 1st applicant told her it was a mistake and it would be rectified. PW1 then found out from the August 2001 statement that an amount of $2 million had been withdrawn from his account without his authority. He went to see the manager on 6.9.2001 and met the 1st applicant. She told him it was a mistake and the amount was in fact transferred to PW1's fixed deposit account. But there was no such transfer on the Bank records.

17. On 18.7.2001 the 1st applicant used the computer of PW5, a teller of the Bank, to effect a transfer. The record showed that $1.5 million was withdrawn from PW1's account on that day. Shortly thereafter on the same day, a sum of $1,158,000 was deposited into the account of the solicitors WC Lee and the relevant deposit slip was faxed to the solicitors firm. The slip was in the handwriting of the lst applicant. The 1st applicant told PW5 that the balance of $342,000 would be in cash taken from the vault. PW5 then recorded this amount as cash transfer.

18. On 16.8.2001 at the close of business, PW6, another teller of the Bank, effected a transfer of $2 million to the account of J's Company with an unsigned withdrawal slip. Prior to the transfer, PW6 queried the 1st applicant about the signature. The 1st applicant told her that the slip would be signed by the customer in a couple of days. All the transfer slips for the two days of 15.8.2001 and 16.8.2001 were recovered from the Bank record except the transfer slip of the $2 million transaction.

19. The prosecution also relied on the recorded telephone conversations between the 1st applicant and the 2nd applicant. They did not dispute the authenticity of these conversations. According to these conversations, on 14.8.2001, the 2nd applicant told the 1st applicant that she needed more than $3 million and on 15.8.2001, she told the 1st applicant this was the deadline. When the 1st applicant said that this could not be done, the 2nd applicant told her that it must be done by 17.8.2001. After several conversations on that day, the 2nd applicant asked the 1st applicant if she would agree to transfer $2 million and instructed the latter to transfer it to the savings account of J's Company.

20. There was also evidence that after the transfer of $2 million, the 2nd applicant made twelve separate withdrawals of the money from the J's Company account.

21. The evidence on the 3rd charge was that PW7 deposited $550,000 in fixed deposit with the Bank and instructed the lst applicant to renew the deposit principal and interest automatically every month. The Bank's overriding transaction record shows that on 8.12.2000, the whole amount then standing in the account was transferred in two separate sums into the account of the 1st applicant's husband, one of these sums was authorized by the 1st applicant using her overriding authority. The record shows that over a period of months thereafter, the 1st applicant carried out a series of renewing the deposit and subsequently, effecting an error correction to cover her theft.

22. The 1st applicant gave no evidence. The 2nd applicant's evidence was that after the $1,158,000 cheque was dishonoured on 11.7.2001, her Malaysian friend came up with funds and she took $1.16 million in cash to the Bank and handed it to PW5 with instruction to deposit $1,158,000 into the account of WC Lee. PW5 gave her a deposit slip of that amount together with $2,000 change. However, she was unable to produce this deposit slip.

23. She also said the Bank had approved a grant of loan facilities and overdraft totaling $15 million. But the correspondence between the Bank and the solicitors showed that the Bank's approval was subject to her making funds available and she had not been able to do so. She also relied on a mortgage application but the Bank remarked on the application that she was unwilling to provide written details of her total assets.

24. Her evidence was also that on 15.8.2001, her buyer had through their Singapore manager brought to her cash $800,000 and a deposit slip of $2 million but she was unable to produce the deposit slip in respect of the amount of $2 million.

25. The judge found that there is nothing to undermine the prosecution evidence, all of which she accepted as sound and reliable.

26. The judge relied on the evidence of PW5 and PW6 and the telephone conversations between the two applicants and convicted them of the 1st and 2nd charge.

27. The judge found that 1st applicant dishonestly effected the transfer of the amount in the 3rd charge into her husband's account and covered her theft with a series of making deposits and error corrections. She convicted the 1st applicant of the 3rd charge.

28. On the 4th and 5th charge, the judge inferred from all the evidence that the 2nd applicant had :

"willfully encouraged and prevailed on Dl to steal a chose in action and credit $1,158,000 for the second deposit on her property purchase into WC Lee's account so that it could be paid in time. D2 was not concerned how D1 achieved this but knew the credited sum came from a theft."

29. The judge's conclusion is :

"the evidence shows a course of criminal conduct with D2 willfully encouraging and prevailing on D1 to put her in funds which she readily used knowing they were proceeds from theft. I am satisfied the evidence against the defendants are overwhelming."

30. The judge convicted the 2nd applicant of the 4th and 5th charge.

31. In my opinion, it is clear that the judge had rejected the evidence of the 2nd applicant. The judge accepted the prosecution evidence and her conclusions are findings of facts and there was ample evidence to support the findings. There can be no arguable grounds on appeal against conviction in both the 1st and 2nd applicants' case.

32. Both applications for leave to appeal against conviction are dismissed.

33. On sentence, the judge accepted the 1st applicant had worked hard to achieve her position as senior officer in the Bank and she committed the offences not out of personal greed but to help her family and friend.

34. The amount involved in the case of the 1st applicant was over $4 million in total.

35. The amount involved in the case of 2nd applicant was $3.5 million but she had three previous convictions all involving dishonesty.

36. The sentencing guidelines for breach of trust in R v Trevor Clark [1998] 2 Cr App R 137 adopted in SJ v Wong Kay Din CAAR No.7 of 1998 (unreported) show that for the amounts involved in the present charges the sentence would be in the region of 3 to 4 years.

37. As regards the mistake the 2nd applicant has stated, the judge found out that she had added the words "by one month" at the end of passing sentence but in my opinion, the added sentence had no specific meaning and that does not add anything to the sentence which was passed.

38. The total sentence of 3 years and 2 months of the 1st applicant who has a clear record and had stolen over $4 million is well within the guidelines.

39. The total sentence of 3 years and 5 months imprisonment of the 2nd applicant who has three previous convictions involving dishonesty and who had personal gain through the thefts is also well within the guidelines. Taking into consideration the sentence she was also serving at the time of sentencing on a totality basis, the sentence imposed cannot be argued as manifestly excessive or wrong in principle.

40. The applications for leave to appeal against sentence of both applicants are dismissed.

(Arthur Leong)
Chief Judge, High Court

Representation:

1st and 2nd Applicants - in person.

Mr Jonathan Man, Senior Government Counsel, for HKSAR/Respondent.