statutory amendments will, in the due course of time, become similarly
applicable in Hong Kong.
8.
Your Petitioner begs to draw the notice of Your Excellency-in-
Council to Section 1(1) of the Murder (Abolition of the Death Penalty) Act
1065 of England by which it is enacted that no person shall suffer death for
murder. Also in the recent motion for the revival of the death penalty in
Parliament on a no party vote basis, the said motion was defeated.
It is clear from this that had Your Petitioner been convicted of
the same offence in England, a sentence of death could not have been passed
upon him.
9.
Your Excellency-in-Council's attention is also drawn to the
Criminal Law Review for April 1967 at page 191 which refers to the Draft
Clauses proposed by the law Commission on Imputed Criminal Intent
(D. P. P. v. Smith) which was established for the purpose of considering
amendment to the existing legishtion relating to criminal Intent. (Part of
these proposals have now been enacted as law in the Criminal Justice Act
1967 and in the Criminal Procedure (Amendment) Ordinance 1971). In
Clause 2(1) thereof at page 191 the Draft Clause suggests amendment as
follows :
Where a person kills another, the killing shall not amount
to murder unless done with an intent to kill.
Clause 2(7) proposed by the Law Commission states :
A person has an intent to kill if he means his actions to kill
or if he is willing for his actions, though meant for another
purpose, to kill in accomplishing that purpose.
The Commission at paragraph 17 states :
We think that the simplest most practical and logical criterion
5-