KOROR (Palau Horizon) – The Palau Supreme Court Trial Division sentenced a Chinese national to 50 years in jail and also ordered him to pay a fine of $200,000 for importing 300 grams of methamphetamine or “ice.”
Chief Justice Arthur Ngiraklsong said Liu Man Chuen will serve the sentence consecutively—25 years for ice importation and another 25 years for trafficking.
Liu said he would appeal the ruling.
He was arrested by the Bureau of Public Safety in June 2000 while delivering about 300 grams of ice to a buyer in exchange for $5,000. Liu later admitted that he imported the illegal drugs from Hong Kong.
Ngiraklsong said the motion for judgment of acquittal filed by the defendant was “not credible.”
Liu earlier asked the court to dismiss his case on the grounds of “entrapment, outrageous conduct and compulsion.”
Liu argued that he was forced to sell ice because the informant threatened to kill him and he was not aware that it is unlawful to import ice.
However, Ngiraklsong said the defendant did not indicate “reluctance, hesitation or a change of heart or mind in devising the criminal scheme.”
He added, “The court rejects all of these claims by the defendant as being simply not credible. Specifically, the court finds as a matter of fact that the defendant was fully aware that importing and selling of ice was illegal in Palau. The court finds that the defendant resorted to the importation and trafficking of ice because his businesses had either failed or were failing and his financial status was desperate and worsening.” Court records showed that the buyer of ice was arrested for the same offense and agreed to cooperate with the Bureau of Public Safety.
The buyer told police that the defendant offered to sell him one kilo of ice.
A taped conversation between the defendant and the buyer indicated that Liu was “excited about his opportunity to sell ice.”
“The court finds that the government proved beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant was predisposed to import and traffic in ice even before the informant became an informant and that the defendant’s intent to commit the crime did not waver from the beginning to end,” Ngiraklsong said in the decision.
