Taipei police last night nabbed a man who was believed to be the "rice bomber," but the police declined to confirm whether the suspect was indeed the criminal.
"Since the man is still under interrogation, we can't tell whether he is the rice bomber," a police source said.
PHOTO: TAIPEI CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT
According to the source, the man perfectly fits the physical characters shown in the photos released by the police on Wednesday.
The Taipei Police Department's Criminal Investigation Corps (CIC) on Wednesday released a picture of a suspect who could be the notorious "rice bomber," and announced an NT$500,000 reward to anyone who could provide information that leads to the bomber's arrest.
The picture of the suspect was captured from video footage from a security camera at the corner of Taipei City's Zhongshan S Road at 5:17pm on Nov. 11. The police believe that, when the video footage was taken, the suspect must have just finished planting the bomb, which exploded in front of the Ministry of Education the following day.
"We have reviewed all the video footage and talked to all the witnesses who might have seen the suspect before we decided the man in the picture could be him," said Hsu Hung-ping (
In the picture, the man appears to be in his early 20s and approximately 165cm to 170cm tall. Officers said that the suspect would change clothes after he committed a crime, before he left the scene.
"If you have any related information, please call 02-2381-7409, 02-2767-6676, 0910-222-432 or 0931-770-110 to reach the police," Hsu said.
Ever since the rice bomber's first case on Oct. 27 last year, there have been 13 rice-bomber-related cases in the city. The rice bomber has admitted to at least eight of them.
"He always alerts the media and the police every time he commits a crime," Hsu said.
The suspect earned the moniker "rice bomber" because he always leaves behind a letter and a small packet of rice along with the explosive device.
In one letter, the rice bomber claimed that he is a protester who wants to urge the government to stop importing rice and start protecting local rice farmers. The bomber has claimed that the bomb attack on a train from Keelung to Chunan on Feb. 2 was his work, as well as seven attacks in Taipei City since Oct. 27 last year.
The first "rice bomb" was found in Da-an Forest Park on Oct. 27 last year, and another bomb was found on Nov. 13 in one of the park's men's restrooms. On Nov. 22, another bomb was discovered in front of the Ministry of Finance's Financial Data Center.
On Dec. 2, a fourth bomb was discovered in the MRT's Guting Station, while on Dec. 10 and Dec. 23 two more bombs appeared in Taipei's Hsinsheng and Yucheng parks.
However, none of the "rice bombs" -- including the bombs that actually exploded -- have injured anyone.
CHAMPIONS: President Lai congratulated the players’ outstanding performance, cheering them for marking a new milestone in the nation’s baseball history Taiwan on Sunday won their first Little League Baseball World Series (LLBWS) title in 29 years, as Taipei’s Dong Yuan Elementary School defeated a team from Las Vegas 7-0 in the championship game in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It was Taiwan’s first championship in the annual tournament since 1996, ending a nearly three-decade drought. “It has been a very long time ... and we finally made it,” Taiwan manager Lai Min-nan (賴敏男) said after the game. Lai said he last managed a Dong Yuan team in at the South Williamsport in 2015, when they were eliminated after four games. “There is
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have declared they survived recall votes to remove them from office today, although official results are still pending as the vote counting continues. Although final tallies from the Central Election Commission (CEC) are still pending, preliminary results indicate that the recall campaigns against all seven KMT lawmakers have fallen short. As of 6:10 pm, Taichung Legislators Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), Hsinchu County Legislator Lin Szu-ming (林思銘), Nantou County Legislator Ma Wen-chun (馬文君) and New Taipei City Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) had all announced they
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) yesterday visited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), as the chipmaker prepares for volume production of Nvidia’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) chips. It was Huang’s third trip to Taiwan this year, indicating that Nvidia’s supply chain is deeply connected to Taiwan. Its partners also include packager Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密) and server makers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and Quanta Computer Inc (廣達). “My main purpose is to visit TSMC,” Huang said yesterday. “As you know, we have next-generation architecture called Rubin. Rubin is very advanced. We have now taped out six brand new
POWER PLANT POLL: The TPP said the number of ‘yes’ votes showed that the energy policy should be corrected, and the KMT said the result was a win for the people’s voice The government does not rule out advanced nuclear energy generation if it meets the government’s three prerequisites, President William Lai (賴清德) said last night after the number of votes in favor of restarting a nuclear power plant outnumbered the “no” votes in a referendum yesterday. The referendum failed to pass, despite getting more “yes” votes, as the Referendum Act (公民投票法) states that the vote would only pass if the votes in favor account for more than one-fourth of the total number of eligible voters and outnumber the opposing votes. Yesterday’s referendum question was: “Do you agree that the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant
RSS