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trafficking: the first was a scheme of automatic indebtedness to the Crown for persons convicted of serious offences under the Dangerous Drugs Ordinance; the second was a scheme for making confiscation orders, based on recently enacted UK Legislation. During the meeting Members had generally
expressed a preference for a modified version of the confiscation orders option on the grounds that it was fairer, even though it would require more resources. Mr WONG said that the Administration had now prepared a revised version of the confiscation orders option according to the advice given by Members at the meeting on 24 November: a paper describing the revised option had been circulated to Members on 14 January 1987 with OMELCO Paper No. 350/86-87.
2.
Mr Mortimer introduced the paper and said that the option had been revised mainly by changing the proposal that the Commissioner of Police and the Commissioner of Customs and Excise should have the powers to issue orders restraining the property of a suspect to a proposal that either Commissioner should apply to the court, ex parte, for the orders. In reply to Mr WONG, Mr Findlay said that the reason for making the application ex parte was to prevent a suspect from being given forewarning of the order and being able to dispose of his property. Mr Martin LEE added that the order could be challenged by the suspect after it had been made.
3.
Mr LEE asked whether some allowance would be made in the restraining of a suspect's property to enable the suspect to draw on the property for money to pay for bills, employees' salaries and living expenses. Mr Mortimer replied that there would be provisions in the legislation for the Court to exercise such discretion.
He said that the Administration had
paid particular attention to the Australian experience in making restraining orders, where it had been found that much of the restrained property had to be gradually liquidated to pay for legal expenses and by the time the confiscation order had been made there was often very little property left: this had been one of the reasons why the Administration had formulated the automatic indebtedness scheme instead of the confiscation order scheme. Members accepted that provision would have to be made to allow some of the restrained property to be liquidated to enable necessary expenses, including legal expenses, to be paid.
4.
In reply to Mr Daw, Mr Findlay said that, if necessary, receivers would be appointed to manage the property of a suspect whose property was restrained.
5.
Mr WONG referred to paragraph 4 of the paper and asked if there were similar arrangements for compensation in the UK legislation. Mr Findlay replied that there were.
6.
Referring to paragraph 6, Mr LEE cited a recent corruption case in which the defendant had demonstrated that the unexplained income that was the subject of the case had
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