The National Police Agency (NPA) has sent the Executive Yuan draft legislation seeking to raise the penalties for stalking and harassment, and give police the power to intervene faster after a complaint has been filed.
A surge in violent assaults by stalkers in the past few years has shown that new legal tools are needed to confront the problem, NPA officials said Saturday.
Many of the perpetrators are former boyfriends or girlfriends who stalk and harass former lovers who terminated the relationship or people who were not interested in them, the officials said.
At present, the law, including the Domestic Violence Prevention Act (家庭暴力防治法), cannot adequately protect the victims of such crimes, for unless there is actual physical assault by the stalker or bodily contact, they can escape with just a light fine, the officials added.
One such case was a male student at Shih Hsin University in Taipei, surnamed Chen (陳), who had had a crush on a female student surnamed Shih (石) ever since she was a first-year high school student and had stalked her for years, they said.
Although Shih in early November 2017 had reported his behavior to a police station in New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋) and asked police to stop him, Chen attacked her in a university hallway on Dec. 11, 2017, slashing her neck and shoulder with a small fruit knife. Shih was not seriously injured.
Another case cited by the NPA officials was that of a Changhua County senior-high school student surnamed Wu (吳), who attacked a student at another high school with a knife because she had rejected him when they were in junior-high school together.
The victim in that case also survived, but not everyone has been so lucky, the officials said.
Under the proposed legislation, a suspect could be investigated for stalking, making threats, physical or verbal harassment, and if the evidence supports the allegations, they could be punished for contravening the Sexual Harassment Prevention Act (性騷擾防治法), the Gender Equity Education Act (性別平等教育法) or the Act of Gender Equality in Employment (性別工作平等法).
If the offender commits a similar violation within a year of repeated harassment, uttering threats, forcible confinement, assault or other actions deemed to cause the victim fear and affects their normal life, then they would be deemed to have committed the crime of “stalking and harassment” under the proposed bill.
The bill would permit police to intervene in cases where the victim’s well-being or life appears to be under threat by directly visiting the alleged perpetrator to warn them, or in cases of an emergency, they could take action to secure potential evidence, check identities and search background records.
If the proposal becomes law, police officers would be authorized to apply for restraining orders from a court, while a victim who has filed a judicial complaint, and is faced with continued stalking and harassment while their case is under investigation or within two years of a convicted offender serving their sentence, can apply directly for a restraining order.
Restraining orders could prohibit harassment, body contact, stalking, personal communications, conversing on telephones or digital devices, as well as bar the disseminating or disclosure of personal information or images, or the use of demeaning and discriminatory remarks, under the proposal.
The bill would also bar stalkers from being near “the workplace, and specific sites frequented by the victim” and forbid them from acting in a way that would violate the victim’s personal safety.
The draft calls for a maximum prison sentence of three years and a maximum fine of NT$300,000 — with an additional punishment of 1.5 times the initial term if an offender has violated a restraining order.
It also proposes authorizing the court, prosecutors or the police to place a suspect or offender under mandatory medical or psychiatric treatment, based on the offender’s mental or physical conditions.
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
AT RISK: The council reiterated that people should seriously consider the necessity of visiting China, after Beijing passed 22 guidelines to punish ‘die-hard’ separatists The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has since Jan. 1 last year received 65 petitions regarding Taiwanese who were interrogated or detained in China, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. Fifty-two either went missing or had their personal freedoms restricted, with some put in criminal detention, while 13 were interrogated and temporarily detained, he said in a radio interview. On June 21 last year, China announced 22 guidelines to punish “die-hard Taiwanese independence separatists,” allowing Chinese courts to try people in absentia. The guidelines are uncivilized and inhumane, allowing Beijing to seize assets and issue the death penalty, with no regard for potential
‘UNITED FRONT’ FRONTS: Barring contact with Huaqiao and Jinan universities is needed to stop China targeting Taiwanese students, the education minister said Taiwan has blacklisted two Chinese universities from conducting academic exchange programs in the nation after reports that the institutes are arms of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) said in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) published yesterday. China’s Huaqiao University in Xiamen and Quanzhou, as well as Jinan University in Guangzhou, which have 600 and 1,500 Taiwanese on their rolls respectively, are under direct control of the Chinese government’s political warfare branch, Cheng said, citing reports by national security officials. A comprehensive ban on Taiwanese institutions collaborating or
RSS