The State Public Prosecutor General's Office called a meeting of chief prosecutors from around the country yesterday to seek their support for the government's new campaign to improve public order and eradicate criminal rings.
It was the first time that the nation's highest prosecution authority has called such a meeting.
State Public Prosecutor General Lu Ren-fa (
As part of the project, Minister of the Interior Yu Cheng-hsien (
Minister of Justice Chen Ding-nan (
However, Chen's announcement prompted a backlash from some prosecutors who pointed out that setting a quota will only hurt the credibility of their office.
In an effort to allay junior prosecutors' worries, Lu said at the meeting that his office will not set any quotas.
"The prosecutors just need to do their utmost," Lu said.
Nevertheless, he claimed it would not be difficult for prosecutors to indict suspects involved in at least 50 organized crime-related cases before May 31, so long as they work closely with police and investigative agents on the 300-plus cases pending investigation.
He urged all prosecutors to speed up their investigations into existing cases.
"If evidence is already available, you should indict the suspects as soon as possible. If no convincing evidence is available, you should close the case to clear the names of the accused," he said.
Lu demanded that the Public Prosecutors' Office of the Taiwan High Court and its branches check the progress of district courts under their jurisdiction each month.
He also urged district prosecutors' offices to cooperate with local police and Investigation Bureau branches in criminal investigations to avoid wasting resources.
He also asked prosecutors to seek the assistance of tax offices in investigating whether companies operated by suspicious people have broken any tax laws.
Prosecutors should also attend all court hearings on cases involving criminal syndicates to ensure that justice is served, Lu said.
Chen, who also attended the opening session of the one-day meeting to boost the morale of prosecutors, said he hopes that law-enforcement officers will conduct spot checks on at least 10,000 suspected drug hideouts and indict suspects in 1,000 drug-related cases.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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