The Ministry of National Defense said yesterday it would pay NT$103.18 million (US$3.4 million) in compensation to the family of an air force serviceman who was wrongly executed 14 years ago for the rape and murder of a young girl.
The sum takes into consideration Chiang Kuo-ching’s (江國慶) detention of 314 days and his execution for a rape and murder he did not commit, the ministry said.
The compensation was calculated based on Ministry of the Interior statistics that show an average life expectancy of 77 years in Taiwan, it added.
Photo: Huang Li-hsiang, Taipei Times
The compensation sum will be finalized if no objections are raised by the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office or by Chiang’s mother, Wang Tsai-lien (王彩蓮), within 20 days, the ministry said.
In 1996, Chiang was accused of raping and killing a five-year-old girl at the Air Force Combat Command in Taipei. He confessed to air force counterintelligence officers that he had committed the crime and was later convicted and sentenced to death. Chiang was executed in 1977 at the age of 21.
However, in a posthumous retrial of the case last month a military court acquitted Chiang of the charges, ruling that his confession had not been given freely and was not admissible. Furthermore, the evidence presented in the case, such as the suspected murder weapon and a tissue stained with the child’s blood, was not conclusive and had not been subject to modern forensic examination, the court ruled.
Once the compensation is settled, the Northern Military District Court will assemble a compensation review committee of legal experts and military court judges to determine whether the military officials involved in the case should be responsible for paying the compensation.
Evidence and documents from the case will be sent to the Supreme Military Court and the Military Supreme Prosecutors’ Office to -determine whether the military officials mismanaged the initial investigation and subsequent trials of the case.
Responding to the compensation ruling, Wang yesterday said all the money in the world cannot bring back her son, adding that the ruling had depressed her more than ever, since all she ever wanted was to claim her son’s innocence.
Wang said she would continue to press charges against former defense minister Chen Chao-min (陳肇敏), who was chief of the Air Force Combat Command at the time.
Media reports in January said that Chen had violated the Code of Court Martial Procedure by erroneously referring Chiang’s case to the counterintelligence agency instead of the judiciary.
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
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
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
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