The Taiwan High Court yesterday handed down reduced jail terms to three high-ranking Taipei police officers for taking bribes from underground gambling operators in a case that began in 2013.
The Taipei District Court in 2016 found police detectives Chen Yun-ning (陳昀寧) and Yang Juei-ho (楊睿禾), as well as special assignment brigade Captain Chiu Ta-jung (邱大榮), all from Taipei’s Wanhua (萬華) Police Precinct, guilty of breaching the Anti-Corruption Act (貪污治罪條例).
Chen was sentenced to 11 years in prison and Yang was handed a nine-year term, while Chiu was sentenced to seven years in jail.
The trio appealed the ruling, and the High Court reduced their sentences to eight-and-a-half years in prison for Chen, six-and-a-half years for Yang and five years and 10 months for Chiu.
However, the court upheld the previous ruling to deprive the trio of their civil rights for two to three years.
The ruling can be appealed.
Investigators in 2013 found evidence of the trio colluding with operators of underground gambling dens.
The officers took bribes, and were treated to banquets and sexual services in exchange for protection from police and providing advance warning of raids in the area, investigators said.
The proprietors passed bribes to the officers through an intermediary, they said.
The High Court also sentenced underground gambling operator Lee Yi-hua (李義華) to 16 months in prison, and sentenced three other proprietors surnamed Sung (宋), Yu (游) and Tso (左) to 20 months in jail.
The court sentenced the intermediary, surnamed Chang (張), to 18 months in prison.
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