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Politician alleges bank obtained illegal pistols

New Party Taipei City Councilor Alex Fei (費鴻泰) alleged yesterday that National Police Administration (NPA) Director-General Wang Chin-wang (王進旺) illegally provided Taiwan Industrial Bank President Law Gin-ming (駱錦明) with five police pistols in 2000.

"According to a secret tip, Law applied for these pistols from the Taipei City Police Headquarters in the name of the bank back in February 2000," Fei said.

"However, the bank did not meet the necessary requirements to be eligible for police pistols, despite the fact they were to be used for security purposes because the bank employs its security guards from a private security company."

Wang was the chief of the Taipei City Police Headquarters before assuming his position at the NPA in August 2000.

According to the NPA, state-run banks are guarded by regular police officers from the NPA's Taiwan Peace Preservation Police Corp (台灣警察保安總隊). Private commercial banks either train their own security guards or hire guards from private security companies.

An officer from the NPA's Public Relations Department who wished to remain anonymous told the Taipei Times that private commercial banks are eligible to apply for police pistols for their own guards. However, these banks are not able to apply for the weapons if they decide to hire their guards from private security companies.

The officer said that the police are not responsible for training bank guards in the use or maintenance of the pistols.

"We just lend them our guns. That's all. The banks have to take care of the training courses to show their guards how to use and maintain the weapons, which can be complicated and troublesome. Maybe that's the reason why many banks prefer to hire private security firms instead of training their own guards and borrowing pistols from the police," he said.

Fei said that although the Taiwan Industrial Bank does not fall into the category of eligibility, Law was still successful in procuring the five firearms, alleging that Wang approved the deal.

"I don't know Law's reason for possessing these pistols. Who is going to take the responsibility if these five pistols are stolen or used for criminal purposes?" Fei said.

The NPA officer told the Taipei Times that all of the guns loaned to banks are used only by bank security guards. The officer added that it was inconceivable that a bank president would be keeping the firearms at home or that a bank could skirt the rules to obtain the pistols.

"Plus, all the police headquarters have their own lists and records of these borrowed pistols," the officer said. "We are quite sure that all the pistols that have been loaned out to banks have been issued legally."
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