Public Prosecutor v Sinnathamby s/o Arumoh

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Sharmila Sripathy-Shanaz
• Judgment Date: 03 November 2022
• Neutral Citation: [2022] SGDC 261
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Docket Number: District Arrest Case No. 904223 of 2020
• Published date: 15 November 2022
• Year: 2022
• Hearing Date: 28 July 2021,29 July 2021,13 July 2022,25 July 2022,26 July 2022,14 October 2022,03 November 2022
• Plaintiff Counsel: Sean Teh and Joseph Gwee (Attorney-General's Chambers)
• Defendant Counsel: Amarjit Singh s/o Hari Singh (Amarjit Sidhu Law Corporation) (till 11 November 2021),Accused in person (from 11 November 2021)
• Subject Matter: Criminal Law,Sentencing,Road Traffic Act,Drink Driving,Repeat Offender,Sentencing Considerations
• Citation: [2022] SGDC 261

District Judge Sharmila Sripathy-Shanaz (delivering the judgment of the court ex tempore): Introduction

I have convicted the Accused of drink-driving. Having considered the parties’ submissions on sentence, my decision is briefly as follows.

The Accused is a Repeat Offender

The Accused is not a first offender. In February 2005, he was convicted under s 67(1)(b) of the Road Traffic Act (“RTA”) and fined $2,200 and disqualified from holding or obtaining a driving licence for a period of not less than 15 months.¹

As a repeat offender, the Accused is liable to be punished with a fine of not less than $5000 and not more than $20,000 and mandatory imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years.² In addition, s 67(2) prescribes that a repeat offender be disqualified from holding or obtaining a driving licence for a period of not less than five years, unless there are special reasons not to make such an order.

The Parties’ Submissions on Sentence

The Prosecution seeks a sentence of six weeks’ imprisonment and a fine of $8000 with a disqualification order of six years.³ In support of his sentencing position, DPP Teh cites the revised sentencing framework in Rafael Voltaire Alzate v PP [2021] SGHC 224 (“Rafael Voltaire”).

The DPP also relies on PP v Vijayan Mahadevan [2022] SGDC 22 where the offender, who had a blood alcohol level of approximately 76 microgrammes per 100 millilitres of breath, had been sentenced to eight weeks’ imprisonment, a fine of $10,000 and a disqualification order of 7 years. The DPP further highlighted the following aggravating factors in this case:⁴ the significant distance travelled by the Accused whilst under the influence of alcohol; the potential harm posed to other road users by virtue of the Accused having driven a heavy vehicle; and the Accused’s conduct at trial.

Save for asking the Court to grant him an adjournment to update his employer of the outcome of these proceedings, the Accused did not proffer anything in mitigation when invited to do so.

Sentencing Considerations

The applicable sentencing framework was set out in Edwin s/o Suse Nathen v PP [2013] 4 SLR 1139 (“Edwin Suse”) and revised in Rafael Voltaire (at [31]). In calibrating the sentence here, I consider it instructive to have regard to the following factors: the extent to which the concentration of alcohol in the Accused’s breath exceeded the prescribed limit; the Accused’s driving history; where repeat offenders are concerned, the period between the previous drink-driving conviction and the commission of the present offence, as this serves as a useful indicator of the efficacy of the earlier sentence in deterring re-offending. The more recent the previous conviction, the greater the need for deterrence to feature in the sentence imposed; the actual or potential danger posed by the Accused’s conduct in committing the offence;⁵ and the Accused’s conduct at trial.⁶

The Sentence Imposed

Having regard to the factors distilled above, I would make the following observations vis-à-vis harm and culpability in the present case.

First, while the Accused’s breath alcohol level is not extremely high (placing him within Band 1 of the Rafael Voltaire framework), it cannot be described as being marginally above the prescribed legal limit. I pause to highlight however, that I am...