Suspect's father makes suicide attempt

The father of Huang Chi-feng (黃啟峰), one of the suspects in the sexual assault and murder of the primary school teacher Wu Hsiao-hui (吳曉蕙) eight years ago, attempted to commit suicide yesterday afternoon by drinking pesticide.

According to local Chinese-language media reports, Huang's father was found drinking the pesticide by two of his friends.

He was taken to Taiwan Adventist Hospital and later transferred to Taipei Veterans General Hospital, where he was in critical condition.

Veterans General Hospital said yesterday evening that he was no longer in a critical condition, but would remain in the hospital for further observation.

The suicide attempt followed a press conference called by Huang's father.

At the press conference he was asked how he could apologize to Wu's father for his son's alleged offense. He responded by saying that he would have killed himself to atone for his son's crime if it weren't for the fact that he has to take care of his elderly mother and children.

He called the press conference yesterday morning to express his remorse for the crime he said his son had committed. Police said on Wednesday that Huang Chi-feng and Wang Yu-chuan (王鈺銓) had confessed to the crime.

Wu Chen-chi (吳振吉), the incumbent director of Keelung City Police Headquarters, is the father of Wu Hsiao-hui.

"Although Huang Chi-feng is the one who committed the offense, I will have to bear the responsibility of his crime because he is my son," Huang's father said.

He said he did not know what his son had done until the Criminal Investigation Bureau (刑事局) informed him. He said that he had not eaten or slept since he was told of the crime.

On hearing of Huang's suicide attempt, Wu responded that he was not assigning blame to the parents of the suspects and that he hoped Huang would recover as soon as possible.