Public Prosecutor v Ng Wei Wen Allan

• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Judge: Christopher Goh Eng Chiang
• Judgment Date: 26 April 2022
• Neutral Citation: [2022] SGDC 86
• Citation: [2022] SGDC 86
• Docket Number: District Arrest Case No. 912797 of 2017 and others, Magistrate’s Appeal No. 9068-2022-01
• Plaintiff Counsel: Lim Yu Hui (Attorney-General's Chambers)
• Defendant Counsel: Accused in Person

District Judge Christopher Goh Eng Chiang: Introduction

This is an appeal filed by the accused, Ng Wei Wen Allan (“the accused”), who was dissatisfied with my decision to impose an additional sentence of two weeks’ imprisonment for each of the six strokes of the cane that he had been exempted from, and that the additional term of imprisonment, totalling 12 weeks was to commence after the expiry of his present sentence.

Background The charges

On 20 August 2020, the accused pleaded guilty a total of five charges. These included one charge for rioting under s 147 of the Penal Code (Cap 224) (“PC”), one charge for voluntarily causing grievous hurt with a weapon under s 326 of the PC and one charge each under s 9(1)(a), s 9(1)(c) and s 8(1) of the Remote Gambling Act 2014 (No. 34 of 2014) (“RGA”).

Two more charges under s 8(1) of the RGA were taken into consideration for the purposes of sentencing (“TIC”).

Summary of the facts (DAC-912797-2017 and DAC-913446-2018)

As the accused is only appealing against the additional term of twelve imprisonment imposed in lieu of caning and that the sentence of caning had been imposed for the two PC offences, the brief summary of facts set out below will only relate to these two charges, namely DAC-912797-2017 and DAC-913446-2018.

On the morning of 16 April 2017, at about 0410 hours, the accused, with several other persons, were driving in the Clarke Quay multi-storey carpark in a convoy of three cars. When they were at level 2A of the carpark, a person (“the deceased”) kicked out at one of the cars as it drove by. This caused one of the co-accused persons to come out of his car to deliver a punch at the deceased. The deceased fell down, hitting his head on the ground. He subsequently passed away due to the head injury.

Two of the deceased’s friends who were walking ahead, then walked towards him. As they did so, the accused came out of his car with a metal bar and used it to strike the first victim, causing him grievous hurt.

As the second victim tried to intervene, he was also hit by the metal bar welded by the accused. Thereafter, the second victim was set upon by the accused and six other co-accused persons. The accused and the co-accused persons then left the scene before the arrival of the police.

The sentences imposed

On 16 November 2020, the following sentences were imposed :

Case No	Offence	Sentence
DAC-912797-2017	s 147 PC	17 months' imprisonment and three strokes of the cane
DAC-913446-2018	s 326 PC	12 months' imprisonment and three strokes of the cane
DAC-913450-2018	s 9(1)(a) RGA	2 weeks' imprisonment and fine of $20,000, in default 40 days' imprisonment.
DAC-913451-2018	s 9(1)(c) RGA	2 weeks' imprisonment and fine of $20,000, in default 40 days' imprisonment
DAC-913452-2018	s 8(1) RGA	$1,500 in default three days' imprisonment
Total Sentence	Imprisonment terms in DAC-912797-2017 and DAC-913446-2018 to run consecutively: 29 months' imprisonment, 6 strokes of the cane and fine of $41,500, in default 83 days' imprisonment wef 16 November 2020

The accused is found medically unfit to be caned

The Court was informed vide a medical memorandum dated 16 March 2022 that the accused had been certified unfit to be caned by the medical officer due to a back problem. Court was also informed that the accused earliest date of release was 20 August 2022. The matter was fixed for hearing on 30 March 2022.

At the hearing on 30 March 2022, the Prosecution submitted that, following the decision of the High Court in Amin bin Abdullah v Public Prosecutor [2017] SGHC 904 (“Amin”), an additional term of imprisonment in lieu of caning was warranted in this case and that the appropriate length of the enhancement was three months’ imprisonment in lieu of six strokes of the cane.

The accused, who was in person,...