The Miaoli District Court has granted a request by prosecutors to detain a man suspected of placing a 4kg gas cylinder on railway tracks in Miaoli County on May 2, resulting in damage to a train, railway police said on Friday.
Miaoli prosecutors applied for permission to detain the suspect, surnamed Chen (陳), late on Wednesday due to the seriousness of the alleged crime and concerns that the man could flee the country, the Railway Police Bureau’s Taichung Precinct said in a statement.
The detention request was approved on Thursday, police said.
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The precinct said that it organized a team to investigate immediately after receiving a report about an express train hitting a gas cylinder on a northbound line in Jhunan Township (竹南) early on May 2.
The team reviewed security footage that showed Chen arriving at the site on a bicycle, carrying the gas cylinder to the line and changing his clothes afterward, it said.
When the Tze-Chiang Express 272 hit the gas cylinder, a waterpipe was damaged and the train was forced to stop at 5:42am, railway police said.
Seven train services and about 840 passengers were affected by the incident, railway police said, adding that a warrant was issued for Chen’s arrest on May 7.
Chen, 46, lives in Hsinchu and works part time in Hsinchu and Miaoli. He was apprehended on Wednesday in Miaoli, prosecutors said.
He was handed over to prosecutors in Miaoli on suspicion of offenses against public safety, they said.
If found guilty, Chen faces a minimum of five years in prison for attempting to sabotage the operation of a train carrying passengers, according to the Criminal Code, prosecutors said.
Further details related to the incident would be clarified over the next few days, they said.
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