The Supreme Court on Monday upheld a guilty verdict and prison sentence for the owner of an English school who was found to have abused a young boy attending its kindergarten and daycare center in 2014.
The Supreme Court said it turned down an appeal by the owner, a woman surnamed Lin (林), and upheld the High Court’s 28-month jail term issued in February last year.
The ruling is final and cannot be appealed.
Photo: Chang Wen-chuan, Taipei Times
A lower court convicted Lin and two others, surnamed Liu (劉) and Chin (金), of plunging the head of the boy, surnamed Liang (梁), into a bucket of water or a pond in which children played, causing him to choke, the Supreme Court said.
They also allegedly forced him to do split jumps if he could not hold a squatting position long enough, had him take his clothes off in winter and subjected him to a cold shower, and prohibited him from drinking water or going to the bathroom after drinking water, the court said.
Lin allegedly gave the child hot and sour soup that had gone bad or was too spicy, hit his body and head using a paddle shaped like a small hand, and made him do homework on his hands and knees, resulting in physical injuries, it said.
Although Liang tried to tell his mother about the abuse, she did not believe him because of the excuses Lin gave, the ruling said.
After seeing a news report about other kids being mistreated at the same school in November 2014, the child spoke out, it said.
That led Liang’s parents to file a criminal complaint against Lin, Liu and Chin with the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office.
Prosecutors charged Lin with child abuse, and the Taipei District Court sentenced her to three years and 10 months in jail, which she appealed.
The High Court reduced the sentence to 28 months on the grounds that Lin had agreed to pay the family compensation, although Lin and the family have not agreed on an amount.
The Taipei District Court gave Liu a six-month sentence, commutable to a fine, and Chin a six-month sentence, commutable to a fine and suspended for four years, and also required Chin to perform 90 hours of community service.
TENSIONS: The Chinese aircraft and vessels were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a joint air and sea military exercise, the Ministry of National Defense said A relatively large number of Chinese military aircraft and vessels were detected in Taiwan’s vicinity yesterday morning, apparently en route to a Chinese military exercise in the western Pacific, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. In a statement, the ministry said 36 Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) aircraft, including J-16 fighters and nuclear-capable H-6 bombers, crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait or an extension of it, and were detected in the southern and southeastern parts of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) from 5:20am to 9:30am yesterday. They were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a
Honor guards are to stop performing changing of the guard ceremonies around a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to avoid “worshiping authoritarianism,” the Ministry of Culture said yesterday. The fate of the bronze statue has long been the subject of fierce and polarizing debate in Taiwan, which has transformed from an autocracy under Chiang into one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies. The changing of the guard each hour at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei is a major tourist attraction, but starting from 9am on Monday, the ceremony is to be moved outdoors to Democracy Boulevard, outside the eponymous blue-and-white memorial
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supports peaceful unification with China, and President William Lai (賴清德) is “a bit naive” for being a “practical worker for Taiwanese independence,” former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview published yesterday. Asked about whether the KMT is on the same page as the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on the issue of Taiwanese independence or unification with China, Ma told the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily that they are not. While the KMT supports peaceful unification and is against unification by force, the DPP opposes unification as such and
CASES SLOWING: Although weekly COVID-19 cases are rising, the growth rate has been falling, from 90 percent to 30 percent, 14 percent and 6 percent, the CDC said COVID-19 hospitalizations last week rose 6 percent to 987, while deaths soared 55 percent to 99, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, adding that the recent wave of infections would likely peak this week. People aged 65 or older accounted for 79 percent of the hospitalizations and 90 percent of the deaths, the majority of whom have or had underlying health conditions, CDC data showed. The youngest hospitalized case last week was a six-month-old, who was born preterm and was unvaccinated, CDC physician Lin Yung-ching (林詠青) said. The infant had a fever, coughing and a runny nose early this month, but