Drug offender's appeal dismissed
By Malai FadleyRizal

Jailed drug offender, Lo Yuen Kim's appeal recently before the High Court was dismissed. He appealed for his sentence to be backdated from the day he was sent for remand instead of commencing on the sentencing day itself as ordered by the Magistrates' Court.

Lo, according to the High Court Judgement, faced a charge of having in possession 10 green coloured round tablets containing 674.3626 mg of a class A controlled drug scientifically known as Methylenedioxymethylamphetamine for the purpose of trafficking.

The second charge against him read that he had in his possession 10 green coloured round tablets containing 68.5068 mg of Methylamphetamine, a class A controlled drug. He pleaded guilty towards the charges.

The appellant was defended by Mr Christopher Sawan in the Magistrates' Court who mitigated on behalf of Lo for him to be accorded a minimum sentence in view of his guilty plea, his clean record, his co-operation with the NCB and the "minimal" weight of the drugs found on him.

He also urged the Magistrate to order the sentences to run concurrently as, although they were different charges, they occurred in the same transaction. The Magistrate agreed to this submission and imposed a minimum sentence prescribed for both charges and ordered them to run concurrently with effect from the date of sentence.

In the High Court, Lo, unrepresented, appealed and told Judge Datin Hayati that his only reason for appealing is that he asked for the sentence to take into effect from the date he was remanded which was on November 25, 2002 and not from the date of sentence which was on February 13 this year as ordered by the Magistrates' Court.

The Magistrate had carefully considered the counsel's mitigation and had agreed to impose the minimum sentence for each of the charges and ordered them to run concurrently.

"He ordered the sentence to run from the date it was passed, there being no circumstances to direct otherwise. There is no merit to this appeal and I dismiss it", said the Judge.

Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin