Taipei County fire officials indicted on bribery charges

The Shihlin District Prosecutors Office indicted seven Taipei County fire department officials on bribery charges yesterday.

The allegations came to light following a fire in a 26-story high-tech complex in Hsichih, Taipei County, in May.

Prosecutors allege that since 1997, the officials took bribes from proprietors at the Eastern Science Park complex (東方科學園區) and restaurant-owners in their districts during the Moon and Dragon Boat festivals and at Chinese New Year.

Sources said the proprietors would paid between NT$5,000 and NT$30,000 each time the officials visited them, and that the officials could collect between NT$120,000 and NT$150,000 in bribes annually.

Prosecutors are seeking the heaviest penalties for Kuo Tzu-chuan (郭子詮), the captain of the county's fourth brigade, whose indictment is based on the Statute for the Punishment of Corruption (貪汙治罪條例), as well as embezzlement charges. Prosecutors are requesting a sentence of 30 years in prison.

According to reports, since Kuo assumed office in 1998, he used the 17 squads under his command to collect bribes.

Three officials from the Hsichih squad said that they had been giving a percentage of their bribes to Kuo over the past few years.

The bribes were paid in exchange for providing safety certification to buildings which had not passed fire-safety tests.

Prosecutors asked that Hua Chin-chih (花錦智), captain of the Chinshan fire squad, be sentenced to 15 years in prison, and that the remaining squad captains be sentenced from one to 10 years based on the crimes they committed.

The chief of the Taipei County fire department, Yen Chen-chia (顏振嘉), said he feels great sorrow over the allegations and that he will require his staff to engage in self-examination in hopes of preventing similar cases.