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Mohammad Yusuf v The Queen

Judgment Cited authorities 1 Cited in Precedent Map Related
Vincent
Judgment Date06 July 1982
Subject MatterCriminal Appeal
Judgement NumberCACC553/1982
CourtCourt of Appeal (Hong Kong)
CACC000553/1982 MOHAMMAD YUSUF v. THE QUEEN

CACC000553/1982

Sentence - Conduct of Defence - Serious accusations Made against Police - Manufacturing own Injuries to discredit Police -- Not a Ground for Imposing a Heavier Sentence than, but for the accusations, would have been Passed.

IN THE SUPREME COURT 1982, No. 553
(Criminal)

BETWEEN

MOHAMMAD YUSUF Appellant

AND
THE QUEEN Respondent

_______________

Coram: de Basto, J.

Date: 6 July 1982

__________

JUDGMENT

__________

1. The appellant has been some twenty years in the Police Force in the last eight of which he held the rank of sergeant.

2. He was charged with three conspiracies, the first being with two named individuals in 1977, the second being with one of the previously named individuals in 1981 and the third, and the most serious, being with one of the same individuals between 1976 and 1981, to defraud the Transport Department officers of the Hong Kong Government by inducing them by means of false documents statements and representations (being forged Pakistani driving licences, Transport Department application forms for Hong Kong driving licences with false information therein) to issue Hong Kong driving licences to persons who were not entitled to them.

3. Mr. Sparrow conceded the offences were serious ones. As the learned trial magistrate said, ''The driving licences system is to protect the community from incapable drivers. By (the appellant's) acts, for private gain, this sergeant of police put the community at risk".

4. Under the "Direct Issue Procedure" which operates under Regulation 10 of the Road Traffic (Driving Licences) Regulations made under the Road Traffic Ordinance the holder of a valid overseas driving licence issued by a competent authority in certain specified countries (including Pakistan) may apply for a Hong Kong driving licence without having to undergo a driving test.

5. In January 1981 the I.C.A.C. operating through an informant, a Pakistani, obtained certain information.

6. In June 1981 investigating officers of the I.C.A.C. rent to the Lok Ma Chau Police Station at the border in the New Territories. There they arrested the appellant and searched his locker, car and his flat at the Police Married Quarters at Fanling. In the sitting room of the flat the investigators found a tin box which contained three chops, a date stamp bearing the date the 19th May 1979, an ink pad and a bottle of ink. The three chops were (1) Traffic Department, Pakistan, Rawalpindi (2) Licencing Authority and (3) Paid.

7. The appellant was asked about these items and the appellant denied ownership and claimed they had been given to him to keep by another member of the syndicate, Nazar Hussain. Expert opinion was that the ink on the ink pad and the impressions on the Pakistani Licence obtained from the Transport Department in the name of the I.C.A.C.'s informant were chemically identical and that the impressions on that licence could have been made by the chops found in The appellant's flat.

8. The appellant pleaded not guilty to all three charges but after the trial magistrate had ruled that a cautioned statement made by the appellant was admissible in evidence as being free and voluntary, the appellant changed his plea to guilty on all three charges.

9. The first additional ground of appeal was that the learned magistrate had placed great weight upon the fact that the appellant had played the primary role in the conspiracy when this was not the only inference to be drawn from the facts and the magistrate should have drawn the inference most favourable to the appellant. The learned magistrate, when passing sentence, said that the appellant was the main conspirator and implementer in this case. In his "Reasons for Sentence" the learned magistrate said he was satisfied from the appellant's position, the location of the exhibits and all the circumstances that his was not a subsidiary role. I am satisfied that there was ample evidence on which the magistrate could have properly reached the conclusion that the appellant had played a major rather than a subordinate role.

10. The third and fourth grounds of appeal were that the magistrate did...

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