High Court Sets Out New Sentencing Framework For Tax Evasion Offences

• Published date: 25 August 2021
• Subject Matter: Tax, Income Tax
• Law Firm: Rajah & Tann
• Author: Mr Vikna Rajah and Hui Min Foo

For justice to be achieved, like cases should be treated alike. When a court is faced with two very similar cases, it should arrive at broadly similar outcomes. Consistency in sentencing - encompassing both the adoption of a consistent methodology as well as the achievement of consistent sentencing outcomes - is therefore crucial to ensuring a fair justice system.

In Tan Song Cheng v Public Prosecutor and another appeal [2021] SGHC 138, the High Court agreed with the prosecution that previous sentencing decisions under section 96(1) of the Income Tax Act lacked a consistent or coherent sentencing approach. As such, the High Court substantially endorsed the five-step framework proposed by the prosecution, transposed from the five-step framework in Logachev Vladislav v Public Prosecutor [2018] 4 SLR 609:

1. Identify the level of harm and the level of culpability;
2. Identify the applicable indicative sentencing range;
3. Identify the appropriate starting point within the indicative sentencing range;
4. Make adjustments to the starting point to take into account offender-specific factors; and
5. Make further adjustments to take into account the totality principle.

In this Update, we elaborate on the framework and examine the factors to be considered.

Factual Background

Section 96(1) of the Income Tax Act ("s 96(1)")...