The Supreme Court has granted a request by lawyers for convicted Taipei MRT killer Cheng Chieh (鄭捷) to appear in person for the upcoming court hearing to appeal his death sentence.
It is the first time a defendant on death row will appear at the Supreme Court for a trial hearing.
Cheng’s legal team is trying to stave off the death sentence, which was handed down by a lower court in March last year, and upheld by the High Court in October last year.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Cheng, then 21 years old, killed four people and injured 22 in a horrific knife attack on the Taipei MRT on May 21, 2014. He is being held at the Taipei Detention Center in New Taipei City’s Tucheng District (土城).
His lawyers, Lin Chun-hung (林俊宏) and Liang Chia-ying (梁家贏), said that Cheng had agreed to make the request, which they made at the Supreme Court’s pre-trial proceedings earlier this week.
They requested that Cheng defend himself at the trial hearing at the Collegiate Bench (合議庭) of the Supreme Court, which is scheduled for April.
Legal authorities said the victims of the attack and their families can also appear in the hearing, and prosecutors can speak on their behalf.
Cheng’s lawyers said the defense could also challenge the constitutionality of the death sentence.
They will seek an interpretation from the Council of Grand Justices, arguing that capital punishment violates the Constitution, they said.
The legal team said they would ask the Supreme Court to suspend the hearing pending a ruling by the grand justices.
Critics called the moves delaying tactics by the lawyers to buy time for Cheng, because the constitutional challenge could take years.
“It is a waste of legal resources, and a waste of taxpayers’ money,” National Taiwan University law professor Lee Mao-sheng (李茂生) said.
“For Supreme Court cases, it is usually the third ruling, which is to decide whether wrongful judicial procedures or contraventions of law had taken place during the first and second rulings. If there were questions, then the case should be sent back for a retrial. In this instance, the Supreme Court is taking on the wrong task,” Lee said.
GEARING UP: An invasion would be difficult and would strain China’s forces, but it has conducted large-scale training supporting an invasion scenario, the report said China increased its military pressure on Taiwan last year and took other steps in preparation for a potential invasion, an annual report published by the US Department of Defense on Wednesday showed. “Throughout 2023, Beijing continued to erode longstanding norms in and around Taiwan by employing a range of pressure tactics against Taiwan,” the report said, which is titled “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China (PRC) 2024.” The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) “is preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the PRC by force, if perceived as necessary by Beijing, while simultaneously deterring, delaying or denying
PEACEFUL RESOLUTION: A statement issued following a meeting between Australia and Britain reiterated support for Taiwan and opposition to change in the Taiwan Strait Canada should support the peaceful resolution of Taiwan’s destiny according to the will of Taiwanese, Canadian lawmakers said in a resolution marking the second anniversary of that nation’s Indo-Pacific strategy on Monday. The Canadian House of Commons committee on Canada-Chinese relations made the comment as part of 34 recommendations for the new edition of the strategy, adding that Ottawa should back Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, first published in October 2022, emphasized that the region’s security, trade, human rights, democracy and environmental protection would play a crucial role in shaping Canada’s future. The strategy called for Canada to deepen
TECH CONFERENCE: Input from industry and academic experts can contribute to future policymaking across government agencies, President William Lai said Multifunctional service robots could be the next new area in which Taiwan could play a significant role, given its strengths in chip manufacturing and software design, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman and chief executive C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. “In the past two months, our customers shared a lot of their future plans with me. Artificial intelligence [AI] and AI applications were the most talked about subjects in our conversation,” Wei said in a speech at the National Science and Technology Conference in Taipei. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, counts Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Apple Inc and
QUICK LOOK: The amendments include stricter recall requirements and Constitutional Court procedures, as well as a big increase in local governments’ budgets Portions of controversial amendments to tighten requirements for recalling officials and Constitutional Court procedures were passed by opposition lawmakers yesterday following clashes between lawmakers in the morning, as Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) members tried to block Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators from entering the chamber. Parts of the Public Officials Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) and Constitutional Court Procedure Act (憲法訴訟法) passed the third reading yesterday. The legislature was still voting on various amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) as of press time last night, after the session was extended to midnight. Amendments to Article 4
RSS