Sworn in a year ago with a declaration of war against "black gold" -- the complicity between corrupt politicians, public officials and gangsters and the manipulation of public affairs by the underworld -- the DPP government and its Ministry of Justice are receiving mixed reviews for their efforts.
Sue Wang (王時思), Executive Director of the Judicial Reform Foundation (民間司法改革基金會), said Minister of Justice Chen Ding-nan's (陳定南) achievement in "keeping prosecutors free of influence from outside [the prosecution system]" should be acknowledged.
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"However, the long-running problem of prosecutors' abuse of power has finally been exposed to the public," Wang said.
She said some prosecutors, especially those in the Special Investigation Forces, which were established last July 1 for the specific purpose of fighting black gold crimes, have gone too far in violating suspects' human rights during investigations -- a complaint echoed frequently over the past year. An example she gave was the search of the China Times Express (中時晚報) newsroom last October.
In the incident, the newspaper published interrogation records regarding National Security Bureau Colonel Liu Kuan-chun's (劉冠軍) embezzlement case. Prosecutors suspected that the paper possessed a pertinent confidential document and launched the search.
The incident in large part pushed the legislature in January to amend the law to deprive prosecutors' of the power to independently launch searches. The amended articles of the Code of Criminal Procedure will take effect on July 1.
"In the debate over a prosecutors' right to instigate searches and amid the prosecutors' resistance to the changes, Chen still claimed that the passage of the amendment would mean that the country surrendered to black gold.
"This tells us that Chen's notion of human rights remains limited," Wang said.
Wang said Chen has defended prosecutors too much even when they have acted inappropriately. "This is unreasonable," she said.
"Prosecutors have rarely campaigned for things other than what concerns their own rights. They must introspect more about the quality of their law enforcement work."
The foundation therefore "relatively" supported Chen during the reshuffle last month of 21 prosecutors general, Wang said.
The reshuffle is believed to be Chen's response to questionable investigative behavior by a number of prosecutors and has so outraged some prosecutors that they have threatened to withdraw from the special investigation forces.
"Sometimes when changes bring resistance from within the system, it means you have to carry out the reform in spite of opposition and challenge those currently influential."
"The point is that Chen must be responsible for the result of the reshuffle, namely, whether it improves prosecutors' performance in the future."
As for the Ministry's achievement in cracking down on black gold, Wang said it is still too early to judge.
"We can't yet say how much time and effort the war against black gold will take. Even for cases where an indictment has been promulgated, it's hard for us to judge whether the prosecutors have gathered sufficient evidence," she said.
"We are now more concerned with whether the proper procedures are followed."
She said, however, that the indictment of Taichung County Speaker Yen Ching-piao (顏清標) for corruption and the progress of several vote-buying cases are major achievements for the government in the anti-black gold effort.
Hsieh Li-kung (謝立功), an associate professor at Central Police University who specializes in the study of money-laundering crimes, says that the fight against black gold now requires a major dose of legal reform.
For example, vote-buying in the ruling DPP's primary was rampant, while Chen Ding-nan said the law enforcement agencies could do nothing because current law prohibiting vote-buying does not apply to the internal affairs of political parties.
He suggested that laws be amended to ban vote-buying in political party primaries so clean elections can be held.
Another reform Hsieh considers necessary for fighting black gold concerns the criminalization of public officials failing to sufficiently explain the sources of their wealth.
Minister Chen proposed the idea of amending the pertinent Statute for the Punishment of Corruption (貪污治罪條例) soon after he assumed office.
According to the draft, which is a reinvention of Hong Kong's Prevention of Bribery Rule introduced during the days of British rule, if a public official subject to a corruption investigation fails to give a satisfactory explanation about his pecuniary resources or property that is disproportionate to his present or past official income, he or she could be charged for the possession of that unexplained property.
Hsieh urged the amendment be pushed forward. According to the MOJ, the draft is still under review, with the MOJ consulting with the Judiciary Yuan, which has a different point of view.
Opponents have said that the amendment violates the principle of the presumption of innocence and infringes on a suspect's right to remain silent.
Hsieh also urged the completion of a database assisting law enforcement in tracking the flow of money between bank accounts when investigating crimes.
The MOJ said the scheme, also proposed in the early stages of Minister Chen's tenure, is being carried out by the Ministry of Finance.
Once it is completed, the ministry says that it will offer prosecutors or the court information about who has accounts and where.
Chen Jui-jen (陳瑞仁), spokesman for the Prosecutors' Reform Association (檢察官改革協會), said that after a year Chen Ding-nan has still failed to provide resources that the prosecution system has long been in need of.
"Successive justice ministers have one thing in common: they use the very scarce resources of the prosecution system to promote their own fame in one dimension or another," Chen Jui-jen said.
"For example, Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) focused on vote-buying; Liao Cheng-hao (廖正豪) on gangsters; Cheng Chung-mo (城仲模) on land protection; now Chen Ding-nan focuses on black gold," he said.
"However, they all failed to reform the system at its roots."
Like Wang, he thought the justice minister was to be commended for ensuring the prosecutors "space" in their job of investigating crimes, which most distinguishes the DPP minister from his KMT predecessors.
"But he has one drawback, he's too self-confident in his own personality and therefore not keen enough on establishing strong institutions."
Chen Jui-jen said in respect of improving the functional condition of prosecutors, the minister nearly "handed in a blank examination sheet."
"Fortunately, after the recent reshuffle of 21 prosecutors general, he did make some compromises."
After the reshuffle and the following uproar, the minister met twice with the Reform Association, promising to make more open the transfer of personnel and to reform and downsize the special investigation forces.
Despite the unsteady steps and occasional troubles of prosecutors, achievements in cracking down on black gold over the past year have been notable, Chen Jui-jen said.
"In regard to both the gravity of cases and the status of the indicted suspects, what the prosecutors have done in the past year has exceeded the sum total of all they did over the past several years," he said. "Just look in the past -- there were far fewer ruling party figures indicted."
"Prosecutors have learned lessons, and have lost what we were supposed to lose [ie, the power of unauthorized search]. I believe they will be much steadier and more successful in the future."
He stressed that the war against black gold will take more than a year, and that it is still far too early to draw a conclusion.
"It is just beginning," he said.
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