The Taichung District Court yesterday handed a combined sentence of eight years and four months to Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) for corruption and forgery.
Yen contravened Article 5 of the Anti-Corruption Act (貪汙治罪條例) by making unlawful profit or withholding public funds under cover of paying a legislative office assistant, the court said in its verdict.
The court also convicted Yen on forgery charges and sentenced him to six months, based on a transaction regarding his family mansion in Taichung’s Shalu District (沙鹿).
Photo: CNA
The building had stirred controversy earlier, as it was partially on state-owned land and an environmental protection area.
For the corruption charges, the court ordered the confiscation of NT$1.08 million (US$32,896) from Yen as illegal profit from pocketing the wages of an office assistant.
The court also deprived Yen of his civil rights for three years.
Prosecutors last year indicted Yen on corruption and forgery charges, as well as over illegal acquisition of state-owned land.
The other defendants were Yen’s wife, Chen Li-ling (陳麗淩); Lin Chin-fu (林進福), a legislative office assistant who owns Yuan-Li Construction Co (苑裡營造), which is affiliated with Yen’s family businesses; Chang Yu-ting (張于廷), owner of Taichung-based Jazz Space Design Co (澤序空間設計); and Yen’s younger brother, Yen Jen-hsien (顏仁賢), who was charged over the illegal acquisition of state-owned land relating to another Yen family mansion in the city’s Nantun District (南屯).
The court acquitted Chen Li-ling, while it found Yen Jen-hsien guilty and handed him a six-month term, which can be commuted to a fine.
Lin was sentenced to seven years and eight months and stripped of his civil rights for two years.
Lin was sentenced to an additional six months for document forgery, but that can be commuted to a fine.
Chang was found guilty on forgery charges and handed a four-month sentence, which the court commuted to a NT$120,000 fine.
Yen Kuan-heng would not lose his legislative office after the ruling, as the Act Governing the Legislative Yuan’s Power (立法院職權行使法) does not require a lawmaker to be dismissed after a corruption conviction in the first ruling.
He would be dismissed from office if he is convicted on corruption charges in a third ruling, meaning on final appeal to the Supreme Court.
Yen Kuan-heng said that he is innocent of all charges and that he would appeal.
The ruling came as a shock and it is regretful, he said.
“My work has always been to serve the people, based on principles of clean politics, fairness and integrity,” he told a news conference.
There been political interference in the judicial process and the justice system is biased, he added.
He also received support from members of the KMT caucus, while party officials said they would not mete out punishment yet under party discipline measures for Yen Kuan-heng, as the ruling is not final.
Yen Kuan-heng was first elected to the Legislative Yuan in 2013 in a by-election in Shalu, replacing his father, Yen Ching-piao (顏清標), who was expelled from office after being sentenced to prison in November 2012 on corruption charges.
Yen Kuan-heng won a second term in the 2016 legislative election, but in 2020 he lost the seat by a margin of 5,000 votes to Chen Po-wei (陳柏惟), who became the Taiwan Statebuilding Party’s only elected lawmaker.
However, Chen Po-wei was ousted in a recall election on Oct. 23, 2021.
Yen Kuan-heng competed against the Democratic Progressive Party’s Lin Ching-yi (林靜儀) in the subsequent by-election in January 2022, but lost.
Yen won back the seat after winning more votes than Lin Ching-yi in the Jan. 13 elections.
Additional reporting by CNA
‘DANGEROUS GAME’: Legislative Yuan budget cuts have already become a point of discussion for Democrats and Republicans in Washington, Elbridge Colby said Taiwan’s fall to China “would be a disaster for American interests” and Taipei must raise defense spending to deter Beijing, US President Donald Trump’s pick to lead Pentagon policy, Elbridge Colby, said on Tuesday during his US Senate confirmation hearing. The nominee for US undersecretary of defense for policy told the Armed Services Committee that Washington needs to motivate Taiwan to avoid a conflict with China and that he is “profoundly disturbed” about its perceived reluctance to raise defense spending closer to 10 percent of GDP. Colby, a China hawk who also served in the Pentagon in Trump’s first team,
SEPARATE: The MAC rebutted Beijing’s claim that Taiwan is China’s province, asserting that UN Resolution 2758 neither mentions Taiwan nor grants the PRC authority over it The “status quo” of democratic Taiwan and autocratic China not belonging to each other has long been recognized by the international community, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday in its rebuttal of Beijing’s claim that Taiwan can only be represented in the UN as “Taiwan, Province of China.” Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) yesterday at a news conference of the third session at the 14th National People’s Congress said that Taiwan can only be referred to as “Taiwan, Province of China” at the UN. Taiwan is an inseparable part of Chinese territory, which is not only history but
CROSSED A LINE: While entertainers working in China have made pro-China statements before, this time it seriously affected the nation’s security and interests, a source said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) late on Saturday night condemned the comments of Taiwanese entertainers who reposted Chinese statements denigrating Taiwan’s sovereignty. The nation’s cross-strait affairs authority issued the statement after several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑), Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜) and Michelle Chen (陳妍希), on Friday and Saturday shared on their respective Sina Weibo (微博) accounts a post by state broadcaster China Central Television. The post showed an image of a map of Taiwan along with the five stars of the Chinese flag, and the message: “Taiwan is never a country. It never was and never will be.” The post followed remarks
INVESTMENT WATCH: The US activity would not affect the firm’s investment in Taiwan, where 11 production lines would likely be completed this year, C.C. Wei said Investments by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) in the US should not be a cause for concern, but rather seen as the moment that the company and Taiwan stepped into the global spotlight, President William Lai (賴清德) told a news conference at the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday alongside TSMC chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家). Wei and US President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday announced plans to invest US$100 billion in the US to build three advanced foundries, two packaging plants, and a research and development center, after Trump threatened to slap tariffs on chips made
RSS