Through his lawyers and aides, gangster-turned-lawmaker Lo Fu-chu (
Lo flew to Hong Kong on Oct. 23, the same day police put him on the list.
Lo's lawyer and aides yesterday refused to accept police documents which confirms the decision to put him on the hoodlum list.
Meanwhile, full-page ads appeared in local Chinese-language newspapers yesterday, featuring Lo's photo and claims of his innocence in a number of criminal cases and disputes.
Police yesterday sent the confirmation document to Lo's office in the Legislative Yuan, only to have it returned by his lawyer, who claimed that aides cannot accept the document in his name. Police said that the notice has been served according to the law.
Since police and Lo's lawyers disagree on whether the notification has been legally delivered, they will have to wait for a decision by the Public Security Court of the Taipei District Court.
Lo's lawyer, Lin Hsien-tong (林憲同), said yesterday that the notification was not served according to procedures prescribed by law. He said that the two notifications for Lo to appear in court were delivered to the Legislative Yuan and Lo's Tashin Securities (大信證券) office, but the issues on which the police want to question him are not related to Lo's position as legislator or chairman of Tashin Securities.
He pointed out that because the designation as a gangster concerns Lo as an individual, neither his assistant in the Legislative Yuan nor employees at Tashin Securities have the right to accept the notice on Lo's behalf. Regardless of whether police send the notification to the Legislative Yuan or to Tashin Securities, it has not been legally delivered if it is not served to Lo himself, Lin said.
In response, officers from the Chungcheng Second Police Precinct said that they issued the notification and sent it together with the confirmation document to the concerned party in accordance with the law. Even though the confirmation document was returned by the concerned party's assistant and lawyer, the police have completed their duty of notifying Lo, the officers said, and there should be no question of it having been sent in violation of legal procedures.
Police usually send hoodlum notifications to the concerned parties within 24 hours. If the party accepts the summons, police send the case file to a public security court for processing. If the concerned party does not accept the summons, the police can request the judge to issue an arrest warrant and forcibly bring the the individual to appear before the court.
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