Criminal appeal dismissed; concurrent sentences for firearm and explosives not excessive despite prior suspended term.

[*394] 1971 December 7

(TRIANTAFYLLIDES , P., L. LOIZOU, HADJIANASTASSIOU, JJ.)

APPELLATE JURISDICTION

Andreas Sofocleous Constantinou,

Appellant,

v.

The Republic,

Respondent.

(Criminal Appeal No. 3294).

Criminal Law - Sentence - Concurrent sentences of rive and two years' imprisonment for carrying a firearm and for possessing explosive substances, respectively - Running concurrently with earlier suspended sentence of four years, for similar offences, which commenced to run again after commission of the above offences - Held not to be excessive.

The Appellant appears in person.

Cl. Antoniades, Counsel of the Republic, for the Respondent.

JUDGMENT

The judgment of the Court was delivered by:-

TRIANTAFYLLTIDES, P.: The appellant appeals against sentences of five years' imprisonment and two years' [*395] imprisonment which were passed upon him in relation, respectively, to counts charging him with unlawfully carrying a firearm contrary to section 3 of the Firearms Law (Cap.57) viz. an automatic sub-machine gun and with possessing explosive substances contrary to section 4 of the Explosive Substances Law (Cap. 54) viz.

50 rounds of ammunition of the same calibre as the sub-machine gun. He has contended that the aforementioned sentences are excessive.

The appellant was arrested on the 13th March, 1971, while carrying the sub-machine gun and the ammunition in a car driven by him; and though his version, as set out in a statement which he made to the police after his arrest and which he has repeated in Court, is that he was on his way to a police station to surrender the firearm and ammunition in question, it is quite clear from the circumstances of the case, especially from the fact that when he was stopped by the police for a search he pretended that he had no idea about anything unlawful being in his car and from the fact that even after part of the ammunition was discovered the appellant did not disclose the existence of the remainder of the ammunition and of the sub-machine gun, that his said version is not a true one and that the Assize Court, which convicted him on his own plea in respect of the offences concerned and sentenced him as complained of, was right in rejecting such version.

The appellant has previous convictions in respect of unlawfully carrying firearms, unlawfully possessing. explosive substances and being a member of an unlawful association. [*396] All such convictions relate to one and the same occasion viz. the raid, on the 23rd May, 1970, against the Limassol Central Police Station, by the appellant and others who stole a considerable quantity of arms and ammunition. The appellant stated that he was given the sub-machine gun in relation to the commission of those offences and that it was not part of what was taken away from the said police station. He was sentenced for the unlawful carrying of firearms to four years’ imprisonment on the 10th December, 1970, and on the 19th January, 1971, his sentence was suspended; but such sentence commenced to run again after he was found in possession of the sub-machine gun, viz. as from the l6th March, 1971.

The sentences of five years’ imprisonment imposed on him in the present ease in respect of carrying the submachine gun and of two years’ in respect of possessing the ammunition are concurrent sentences and they run, also, concurrently with the earlier sentence of four years, which we have just mentioned. They are, therefore, much less severe than they would otherwise be.

No matter what were the circumstances in which the appellant found himself involved in the raid on the police station

- and with such circumstances we are not concerned in this case at all - it is clear that the appellant, notwithstanding the leniency shown to him after that raid, did not decide to disassociate himself from the unlawful handling of firearms and ammunition; and he has, consequently, brought upon himself his present calamity.

We find this appeal entirely groundless and we dismiss it accordingly.

Appeal dismissed.