The owners of a Kaohsiung-based seafood company were yesterday accused of making NT$700 million (US$21.83 million) in the past three years by selling expired seafood to restaurants and traditional markets in central and southern Taiwan, police said.
The Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office is investigating the case for alleged breaches of the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法) and fraud.
The office begun preliminary investigations after it was notified by the municipal Department of Health of a breach of conduct when on Wednesday last week it seized 95 tonnes of frozen seafood at Jenchang Frozen Foods Co (奇美食品).
Photo: Copied by Huang Chien-hua, Taipei Times
The owner of the company, a 60 year-old man surnamed Chen (陳), allegedly worked in collaboration with his son, who managed fresh365, an online delivery Web site.
Chen allegedly cut expiry dates off cardboard boxes containing seafood and repackaged them so his clients would think the seafood had not expired, police said.
Chen also allegedly shelled old shrimp before selling them to market vendors to deceive them into believing it was fresh. Eighty percent of the goods seized were shelled shrimp.
Chen was quoted by police as saying that he had not intended to stockpile so much frozen product, adding that with the decrease in the number of Chinese tourists in Taiwan, he had not been able to sell as much seafood as he had hoped.
Chen was quoted by police as saying that while the seafood has passed its expiry date, all of it was snap-frozen after he purchased it, adding; “It has not spoiled, even though it is not as fresh, it is still edible; it should not be harmful to people.”
The district prosecutors’ office has questioned 11 people, including Chen, and has obtained a list of 30 intermediary wholesalers, it said, adding it is investigating which restaurants and traditional-market vendors have been affected.
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow
RSS