Over the past three years, no fewer than 70,000 of the island's taxi drivers have had their palm prints analyzed in the search for Peng Wan-ru's (
Police say they have never given up hope of catching the man, which they still to this day believe was the taxi driver who picked Peng up that fateful night. The widely held hunch has led police to conduct thousands of roadside inspections on both taxi drivers and other drivers in possession of an older model of the yellow Ford Telstar Peng was last seen climbing into.
To date, police claim to have checked more than 30,000 taxis in extensive regions south of Chiayi County. Not only the drivers, but their families, too.
Put together with spot checks conducted on bus and truck drivers across the island, the total number of people investigated comes to more than 130,000.
While the police force's efforts have no doubt been tireless, however, they have born little fruit, resulting in scathing public criticism being directed against the force for its perceived inefficiency.
The search has not been without its dramatic moments. On at least three occasions, police thought they were on to a certain lead as people came out to admit they had been Peng's killer. Public hopes were soon dashed, however, after initial investigation negated the claims.
Two different men came out with claims about a year apart -- one in July 1998 and the other in June 1999 -- but were later found to have been serving jail terms at the time of Peng's murder. As it turned out, they had been trying to put their families in line for the reward of NT$22 million from police for information leading to Peng's killer.
The third disappointment came in September this year when a taxi driver was found dead in his car with a suicide note, saying, "I apologize about Peng Wan-ru." Unfortunately, blood and fingerprint tests conducted on his body forced police to rule out the possibility that he had indeed been responsible for Peng's murder.
The police's efforts have spawned intense debate between supporters of law enforcement agencies in Taiwan and their most vocal critics, who say Peng's case is the clearest evidence of just how incompetent the nation's public security system is.
Peng's husband, Hung Wan-sheng (
"If the killer is ever arrested, it will be thanks to God's mercy," Hung said. "We've never given up hope that the case would be solved some day. But I've also had to come to terms with the reality that it's not something we can force.
"It was a terrible trauma to go through three years ago, but we've survived. I know many people have focused their attention on the investigation and raised their hopes that the murderer will be found -- which I myself have always hoped for. But I think a top priority now is to see what efforts we can make to ensure another such tragedy is prevented from happening," Hung said.
Peng's 1996 murder came at a sensitive time for the government, as it took place soon after another high-profile killing -- the Nov. 21 assassination of former Taoyuan County Commissioner Liu Pang-yu (
The investigation of the brutal Taoyuan assassination has likewise yielded little progress.
"The longer an investigation, the more difficult it is to find out what the `truth' is," a police official admitted.
When asked whether the police are thinking of taking any new, fresh approaches in investigating Peng's case, the police official gave a standard reply: "We're working hard to examine more taxi drivers in Taiwan."
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
BEIJING’S ‘PAWN’: ‘We, as Chinese, should never forget our roots, history, culture,’ Want Want Holdings general manager Tsai Wang-ting said at a summit in China The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday condemned Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) for making comments at the Cross-Strait Chinese Culture Summit that it said have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty, adding that it would investigate if the group had colluded with China in the matter and contravened cross-strait regulations. The council issued a statement after Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團有限公司) general manager Tsai Wang-ting (蔡旺庭), the third son of the group’s founder, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), said at the summit last week that the group originated in “Chinese Taiwan,” and has developed and prospered in “the motherland.” “We, as Chinese, should never
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying