The day of sentencing, or the day when the distance til the end of the tunnel is decided.
This is the day we’ve all been waiting for 2+ months. Sentencing itself is already unpredictable enough, what makes it even more “exciting” is a sentence length on the lower end of the estimated range could mean that he will be coming home tonight, while a longer one could mean we don’t get to spend his birthday together (2 months away from now).
To help visualize what each sentence length could mean, I even made a chart with a range of possible sentencing scenarios, and calculated potential deduction and what it means in terms of the actual sentencing length. Shared that across with his friends and family involved, so everyone somewhat knows what to expect.
I’m not sure how exactly I’m feeling now. In the past week, I did spend some time to prepare for his returning, things like getting some new towels, washing his pillow case, new slippers etc. So somewhere inside me, I am expecting him to be released today, even with the slightest possibility, and meanwhile, I’m also telling myself not to be too hopeful. Although so far the direction seems to be going towards the positive end, but with cases like this, I’m just worried we might have been estimating in the wrong range.
As usual, we arrived at the court early, and as usual, it took some time for the court to commence .
The judge started by following up with the questions that were left unanswered last time. Drilling into the exact duration of the assembly, and confirming there’s no concrete evidence that the fire nearby started before the arrest took place.
Following that, the lawyer submitted the letters that he wrote in remand to the judge, complementing to what the background report might not have covered. The court was adjourned for 15 minutes or so for the judge to read the letters.
The court resumes – and here comes the most suspenseful moments I’ve ever experienced in the past 27+ years of my life.
First, the judge took Agnes Chow’s unlawful assembly case with 10 months sentencing as a reference case. My heart dropped a little because of the sentencing length. Then the judge explained the level of involvement, duration, and extent of unlawful action involved is much LESS severe than that of Agnes Chow’s case. Therefore it’s a 4 months sentence, with deduction from pleading guilty, and another 2 weeks deduction, resulting in 8-weeks sentence. Here we are at the end of the tunnel (suddenly).
Nobody (including myself) was 100% prepared for this. What we knew already though, is that unlike in the movies, the person being released would just walk out from the dock, cheered by his friends and family, giving each other hugs. In reality, it is still necessary to return to the prison for “check out” procedure.
The rest of the day is pure joy. Not knowing exactly what time he would walk out, Latte and I ended up arriving a bit late, with him already waiting outside. And I’m so glad this is the last time I’ll come to Lai Chi Kok Reception Center for his visits.
Having sat though every single court in this case, I couldn’t help but questioned a few times whether our (or any) justice system actually results in fair judgement.
To look at it from another angle, if there weren’t a different judge for sentencing (if it were the same judge all the way through(who is now the appointed judge for national security law cases), I’m quite certain the result would have been quite different (a lot worse). Then, is this sentencing a fair one? And who are we to judge?
Taking a step further back, the arrest and charges would have never taken place if we were in a just and fair society 🙂
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